


Marked for Death

by cyborgharpy



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alpha/Omega, Alternate Universe - Werewolf, Blood and Violence, Dark Rey (Star Wars), Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Emotional Werewolf Fingering, F/M, Gratuitous Smut, Hurt/Comfort, Light BDSM, Light Dom/sub, Non-Traditional Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Rey has a fur kink, Switching, Werewolf Sex, like seriously, this will grow fur, we're all betas in this universe
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-05
Updated: 2019-01-15
Packaged: 2019-07-25 11:53:32
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 34,477
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16197008
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cyborgharpy/pseuds/cyborgharpy
Summary: Why do you want to kill me?he asks.Alphas are an abomination, she has to force the words to sound aggressive as her body denies her the instinct to pull her ears back, to show her teeth.





	1. How Past Begins

**Author's Note:**

>  
> 
>  
> 
> _It was right that we did meet each other in each other’s eyes_  
>  _It was right that we did see each other in our shadow sides_  
>  _It was wrong then too that crazy love, loves crazy as it does_  
>  _And each of us and both of us so crazy, as it was_  
>     
>  _You were right on time to break your head and make the death bed_  
>  _You were right on time to crash those galaxies and flat-line_  
>  _You were right on time to make the light inside of me a life_  
>  _You were right on time to meet me, crazy love, and watch us die_  
>     
>  _Who else is going to love someone like you, that’s marked for death?_  
>  _Who else is going to be with you when you breathe your last?_  
>  _Who else is going to take my place and hold and keep you safe?_  
>  _Who else would ever stay?_  
>     
> \- [Emma Ruth Rundle “Marked For Death”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H8xSaqLVzUA)
> 
>  
> 
> * * *
> 
> All my thanks and love to my beta [caisha](https://archiveofourown.org/users/caisha/pseuds/caisha) aka [reylosource](http://reylosource.tumblr.com/) on tumblr for being one of my oldest and favorite mutuals, for introducing me to the many nuances of A/b/o, and to holding my hand through posting what will eventually be monsterfucking kink.
> 
> [There's a dark atmospheric metal playlist for this](https://open.spotify.com/user/126963742/playlist/5j1JI5OOMza7n165j8B6lK?si=jqQk-zFVQ5qRGp9Lz9V3Sw) if you like that sort of thing and want to hear the inspo for each chapter.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Past is dead_   
>  _But it's real_   
>  _To me_   
>  _Take some time_   
>  _To reinvent the line_   
>  _That runs towards the moon_   
>  _Slowed down_   
>  _Like clouds in wind_   
>  _Revealing truth to you_
> 
> \- [Angelo de Augustine “How Past Begins”](https://genius.com/Angelo-de-augustine-how-past-begins-lyrics)

Moonlight barely penetrates the thick branches of the trees and their armor of needles as the three wolves find their way. They’re just a hundred miles east of the Redwoods, as the crow flies. The trees are much smaller here, but the light is still a memory by the time it descends to trace gnarled roots and spiderwebs. 

Rey doesn’t spend too much time thinking about the moon. Some of her kind like to worship it, though all the legends of its effects are comically false. To her, it’s just an ugly surface, blasted into ash by a million years of cosmic bombardment. It’s nothing compared to the reality of the loam beneath her feet. 

The forest floor is a mix of new-fallen leaves and centuries of decay, but the soil beneath always smells fresh. The mineral bite washes away the musk of the animals that have moved across it. To a sharp nose, everything that’s drifted across this space in the last few month is recent. The constant rain can’t eliminate the criss-cross tracks of squirrels and nutria, or the marks of lynx and cougars who have all fled in their range. Apex predators recognize their own.

She moves quietly, navigating the darkness with an assuredness she’s never found on two legs. The change always feels like slipping into a new silk dress, and the power it brings is heady. With her nose pointed at the ground she pauses, ears bent backward to listen to the distant snap of branches as something large moves through the forest behind her. Her muscles stretch and snap with each noise, ready to jump and fight at a moment’s notice. 

Finn can’t help but be clumsy—he’s never had to hide the way she had. Underbrush breaks as he takes a meandering path. Rose, silent at her left flank, freezes. 

_I smell something_ , Rose says, voice echoing in her mind. Rey peers through the darkness to watch the smaller wolf—all gold beside her sable-tipped fur—almost climb up a tree as she stands on her hind legs and sniffs at some place high up. 

_You’re going to have to be more descriptive_ , Finn answers—out of sight. 

_It smells like . . . death._ Rose meets Rey’s eyes in the darkness, head bobbing. Her golden eyes tilt to the side as she cocks her head. _Like—_

_Like a skunk,_ Rey finishes, tone firm. Rose gives her a long look before pouncing to the ground, following her nose away into the brambles. There’s no way that she can miss Rose’s fur bristling, her ears perked forwards and step lighter as she lopes off into the void of the far trees. 

Rey refuses to follow the scent. She knows exactly what it is, and why it’s making her mouth water and her heart beat faster. It’s one she’s tried for a long time to forget.

 _I can smell an elk over here. Want to go catch it?_ Finn’s warm voice sounds exasperated even in mental communication. 

Branches creak in the distance: she recognizes a fully grown stag by its careful but awkward step and savory smell. If they were sufficiently keyed up by instinct they would take down the elk together, but it would have been wasted with the food Leia and Holdo have locked up in the cabin. They have enough meat to sustain a whole pack’s months-long foray from an autumn moon to first snowfall, which means they have two full-sized freezers full of it. 

That’s not her quarry tonight, and this isn’t the real hunt. This is defense. 

No one can blame Rey for being protective of the miles of new territory claimed by the Ninka pack. Not after what they’d been through. 

  


* * *

  


There it is again, resinous and faintly bitter and medicinal, like juniper. It conjures up imagery she finds startling; she’s consumed by the urge to roll around on the ground, even as a human, caressed by wildflowers and brambles, to resolve the itch far beneath the surface of her skin. She blinks it off, hiking east. 

The smell of the ocean follows her, wind ruffling her hair as she travels up sand-bound roots to the hills outside of the small town of Manzanita. In human form, she still crouches low to avoid the cars until the 10 is clear. Despite the crosswinds, she can scent it beneath the all-consuming odor of cedars and Douglas fir. It smells like fresh-cut grass and the clean burn of a lightning strike in summer, although it’s a rare, clear-skied October evening. The call to find its source is overwriting everything in small drifts and waves, making her head dizzy with anticipation. 

Earlier that day she had wandered the beach, bare toes in the sand before carefully moving time-rounded rocks against each other with each step up the shore. She’d watched her new friends—her pack—disseminate across the open beach, enjoying their short time among humanity. She’d followed a creek up from the tideline, smelling each child who had passed here, each mother and father that followed.. 

The deep blue-green of the pines had called her to take one of the night-time journeys she’d longed for in the months in the real world, cleaning up dirty plates or burying her nose in a motorcycle engine. She’s only run with the Organa pack for half a year and still feels like an outsider, but she’s wary to join another group who would inevitably put her at the bottom of the pecking order. A lone wolf was a dead wolf in this savage, over-populated part of the country, but her lot was much, much worse. Since she’d presented at ten years old she’d been hunted, subdued. Enslaved. And it was all over a designation.

Plutt had called her his little scavenger—sending her out on missions to be shot at by drunkards with their pellet guns in her search of abandoned houses or junk piles to raid in the woods lining the Columbia River’s course out to the sea. It had been dangerous work, and all for naught when she’d ended up homeless, surviving on the edges of Forest Park, eating from rubbish bins. She’d always been small enough to pass for a coyote in the dimness of the evening, with a similar coloration. That’s how Finn had found her, out on a walk with a small fox-like dog that seemed unaffected by her—and when she came close enough to scent him, it was easy to see why. 

Finn wasn’t just a cross-human, he was another wolf. He’d been alone, too, until he’d found a pack who accepted the broken and lonely and didn’t allow the displays of dominance and constant aggression of less stable groups. It hadn’t been a question of whether or not she’d join, not when she needed safety in numbers. Looking back, it was the best thing that had happened to her in her entire life.

Rey’s cheap thrift store dress flutters to the ground as she changes under the sun-dappled shade of the birch trees near the highway. She fights the stinging exhaust rolling off the sour asphalt by pawing at her snout before setting out at a breakneck speed through the brush, avoiding homes and well-worn hiking paths. The newfound freedom of having space to run fills her with the kind of joy that rarely surfaces, making her tail curl behind her. 

She runs for miles, easily. The land reaches elevation so quickly it would be a slog for anyone, but her speed is just as preternatural as the rest of her gifts. Strength, quickness, reactivity, the fast pace with which muscles and flesh can knit back together—these are only a few boons. They would have called it lycanthropy in another time, but now she’s just a changer. Wolf. And something _else_. 

That something has her tracking. It had seemed like a game, at first—finding new places to explore, new trails, all while holding on to the tingling in her throat with each intake of breath. There’s a clarity to the golden light shifting across the umber layer of dead leaves blanketing the ground. She’s drawn by a kind of music, a siren’s song in the particles of pollen and fern spores floating in the air. 

The source is in a logging field, and she finds it just as the shadows stretch their longest before the sun disappears into the Pacific behind her. The ink spot traveling across the desolate space would be impossible to see without her new eyes. He’s silent, not moving a branch or disturbing a twig even with his nose low to the ground. There’s a deliberateness in his movements as he threads through the broken bodies of trees deemed too rotten or useless to harvest, his head and ears standing up when he’s alerted to her smell. 

He’s massive, a shadow the size of a small horse if such things moved across the ground like a cat. Orange eyes catch the remainder of the sunlight, fixing in her direction. The branches creaking overhead remind her that she’s upwind, here. Surely he can sense her, even if he can’t see her in her hiding place between fallen timber. 

She waits for other wolves to appear in the growing darkness, but there’s only the one. He lopes forward, still untraceable despite their proximity. He’s a hundred yards away when instinct kicks in and Rey scrabbles in the dirt to run towards him, snarling. 

Rey’s hackles are raised, gums pulled back in a grimace as she streaks into a clearing formed by truck tires. The human scent always fades to background noise whenever another of her kind is near, and he smells of allspice and whiskey, with the undercurrents of that fresh wood and herb she’d caught earlier. 

He crouches, teeth bared, as she approaches at breakneck speed, but he doesn’t move forward—he stands his ground. Rey is almost caught off guard, flying forwards to snap her jaw, ears pulled back so far her eyes are narrow slits. She stops before they can meet, shoulders rising to make herself bigger as she paces in front of him.

 _No further_ , she says.

 _This is mine_ , he responds. His voice in her mind is as velvet and deep as his black coloring, white teeth barely visible. He’s an Alpha male—the first she’s ever seen this close. Unlike the alpha parents of traditional wolf packs the cross-human hierarchy has its born leaders, a horrible quirk of their cursed genetics. It’s easy to see it in his bearing—his tail high and his body half a size larger than the norm, like the wolves that hunted her ancestors before the Ice Age. If that weren’t unmistakable, there’s the sharp spike of familiar pheromone that surrounds him, underneath the tantalizing scent she’d been drawn to. 

_Prove it._ She bobs her head in aggressive defiance, rather than the deference that should have her on her belly and rolling over in the presence of an Alpha, especially one that smelled as good as this one. 

He lets out a slow whine, feet slipping before him in a gesture of restraint. This close his curiosity and interest carries on the air—a tang like ambergris. She knows that variation of a male’s scent and she hates it with every fiber of her being. The last time had been when Plutt, her first pack leader, had tried to mate her. She’d ripped open his belly and he’d died while dragging his intestines across the ground, unable to escape her tearing his liver and his heart out to keep him from healing. He’d turned human with the fading of his power—a sad pile of flesh—and she’d worried his arm from its socket and gnawed the white bone into slivers as the rest of the pack watched from a distance. 

_Try me_ , she says with another click of her teeth together, another swish of her brush-tail. He’ll underestimate her just like Plutt had. 

He lunges towards her, jaw closed, the growl in his throat vibrating her senses. She’s not caught unawares, just overwhelmed by the massiveness of his black body rising up over her even as she stands up on two legs. He’s not fighting to kill—not even fighting to intimidate as he twists away from her bite and rolls against her. His head rubs against her neck in a clear signal of dominance, something a packmate would do. It’s what he wanted all along, but she ducks down to snap at his leg, digging in with her teeth until he yelps and dances back. Drops of blood stand out on his black fur, coated in the yellow dust they’d kicked up.

 _Small, but fast._ He ducks his head, indicating acquiescence and no small amount of respect. _Omega._

 _Don’t call me that_ , she snarls, pacing. _You have no power here._

His oversized head angles to the side, tongue showing as his mouth opens in a mockery of a human smile. 

_You’re not safe out here, little girl. Not smelling like_ them _._

Rey bristles, lunging forward to snap at him but he stands his ground, front limb pawing the air.

 _Submit._

It’s a trap shutting around her entire body, forcing it still. Worse, her muscles move of their own volition, lowering her to the ground. Every fiber, every sinew, fights until she’s burning with the pain of not being able to lift a mountain. It’s not fair—it’s not right—but she sits down, sphinx-like as the predator circles her.

 _Why do you want to kill me?_ he asks.

 _Alphas are an abomination_ , she has to force the words to sound aggressive as her body denies her the instinct to pull her ears back, to show her teeth. 

He nudges her neck, nipping softly so that his hot breath _whuffs_ against the flesh beneath the wiry guard hairs that stand out on her spine. She rebels against her body’s urge to lean into it, to bury her nose into his chin. Instead, she stares forward, a statue version of herself. 

_You think you can just take what you want_ , she forces out in her mind. _You can’t._

 _What do you want?_ Rey can’t see him now that he’s passed outside of her circle of vision, distinctly aware he’s behind her, his scent surrounding her, refusing to let her forget his presence and the danger it holds being near him.

_Freedom._

There’s a pause as he nuzzles at her neck from the other side, teeth grazing the skin as he contemplates her response. 

_Then go._ He moves back into her view, ears perking up at the distant sounds of something large moving through the brush at the treeline. Rey’s body goes limp, quivering in the aftermath of trying to find a weak spot on the control that has had her as motionless as a butterfly fixed on a pin. 

_I said go._ This time he says it with urgency, the deep voice in her head like a bell tolling in the distance, and her limbs seize up as she fights the command. His ruddy, amber eyes are locked into hers, pupils dilating as his head lowers and he pushes his snout towards her. _Run._

 _You fucking—_ A rush of adrenaline sends her careening off into the woods, tail between her legs, and at least she finds she can aim herself as she crashes through brush and ferns. She curses at him mentally well after she’s out of range but the link only works for a few hundred yards—and when she’s finally stopped, panting, she fights to find her bearings. 

She’s a mile from where she last stood her ground, written in the fading of the deep howl that follows. It’s victorious in tone, answered by a chorus that’s farther off, but still close. There are at least ten other voices. Suddenly, the danger is here. She runs of her own volition, now, tearing through the violet-shaded trees until the familiar world of the pack’s grounds come into view and scent.

When she returns to the compound only a handful of the wolves are still running in _lupus_ , the rest bearing human forms and the markers of civility: clothing, drinks in hand, illuminated by lanterns flickering with candlelight. They look like any other dinner party but for the shaggy, huge forms moving across the grass outside the main house. Their shared home for a season is a huge mid-century-style cabin, complete with an A-frame-styled entrance.

“There’s another pack.” Rey says once she’s shifted back, crouched naked on her knees in front of the small group on the wraparound porch. Nudity has never been shameful amidst cross-humans but she’s still self-conscious enough to accept the robe brought to her by Finn, who can’t seem to look at her directly. He’s new to the life—a late awakening—and hasn’t been around enough females of their kind not to be slightly embarrassed.

“We heard,” Leia says from the doorway, communicating something to her mate Han before making her way carefully down the stairs. The Organa-Solo alphas are an aging, life-bonded pair, enjoying separate human lives while re-joining for the Hunt once a year. Some deep sorrow exists between them—it tastes like iron and smoke whenever they argue or share a look of solemnity, something they do now. 

“It’s the Maneater,” Han yells down to her. “We got a call from what’s left of the Hosnians. The Order is moving west and claiming new territory.” Chewie, perpetually trapped between man and wolf, lets out a guttural sound that she knows better than speech: _they’re coming._

Rey shudders. The Order _are all_ abominations, the monsters of old in their need for human flesh. Every wolf has tasted it but consumption is different and wrong. Human meat is saturated in chemicals and the horrifying reality of it, but it’s also addictive—the true Hunger instilled in their creation. Old Maz had told her their kind had been made by the ancient Weaver as her revenge on man for the destruction of her forests, her waters, and that the eating of men’s flesh was written into their bones. 

“Did they attack you?” Leia asks, reaching comfortingly for Rey. The older woman’s nostrils flare when she makes contact with her hand, the wine glass slipping from her grip, shattering. Red wine splashes Rey’s bare feet, flooding her senses. It can’t cover Leia’s spike of fear and sadness.

“Sorry,” Leia says, hand reaching back to cover her mouth. Her calm expression is morphing with something unsaid. “I should have been more careful.”

“I saw their alpha. A true Alpha,” Rey murmurs, helping to pick up the broken glass before she’s shooed away by a younger member of the pack with a broom. 

‘I know,” Leia says after a moment. “Let’s go inside.”

She doesn’t know how to comfort the older woman so she simply trails after her back into the house, observing closely as the pack leader communicates non-verbally with Han. They cannot speak to each other by mind in human shape, but they don’t need to. Wolves are more suited to speak with their bodies. Leia motions for Rey to follow her inside, and they are left alone as Han and the others go down to the lawn to call the circle.

Inside the massive kitchen the island is strewn with all the remnants of their nightly feast: a turkey carcass with scattered bones and the scraps of a roast congealing in fat, the bright vegetables cooked with it mostly untouched. Leia’s hand shakes as she pours them both another draught of wine, handing her a full glass. Rey stares at it, sniffing experimentally and enjoying the smell of lands far away, more sun-touched. The acidity and dryness of the first whiff tell a story of the ground the fruit was grown in.

“Drink with me,” Leia says. All alphas can order, but very few can compel. Rey doesn’t need it: she swallows a crimson mouthful, rich with campfire and dark cherries. 

“You know him, don’t you,” she says once she has her courage back. “You smelled him.”

“It’s difficult to ignore it when he marked you with his scent,” Leia admits.

Rey’s face involuntarily scrunches up into the kind of disgusted look she’s more used to with a snout, like she’s just encountered bear scat. 

“I tried to fight him. He was mocking me,” she explains, unsure of why her heart is beating faster at the thought of being claimed, remembering his dry match scent surrounding her during their scuffle. Idiot dogs and their instincts, _always_ , she thinks. She is no one’s territory.

“Rey, you met my son.” Leia’s whisper doesn’t carry past the classical music playing in the other room. 

She holds onto her glass so hard it squeaks, threatening to break. She’s needed years of restraint not to dig her fingers into metal, or to touch a non-cross human gently enough that they would not bruise. She manages to not destroy the glass.

“He let me go.” It spills out of her without thought, unsure why she’s defending him.

“I suspect he wanted to send a message,” Leia says, leaning against the counter. “I’m sorry I put you in harm’s way by not telling you about the threat. About him.”

“Why’s your son a threat?” Rey asks, already knowing the answer. Alphas are dangerous in their own packs, much more alone.

Leia shakes her head, heart-shaped lips pursing into a frown. “My brother tried to tame him but he took to free-changing at a very young age, and Alphas are notoriously anti-social until they make their own pack. He was dangerous. He killed my brother’s wards, and joined with the Order." 

Leia wipes a tear from an age-dotted cheek, her warm brown eyes finding Rey's again.

"He chose the company of anti-human bigots and criminals. They’re out for the blood of anyone who protects the humans.”

Outside, a chorus of howls rise up, the yips and continuing cries raising the hair on the back of Rey’s neck. They are preparing for battle. 

“Will they attack us?” she asks, mouth dry. She drinks again, even if it would take several bottles to get her anywhere near a taste of insobriety. 

“Not if we leave,” Leia says. “But we’re not going anywhere. The other packs are coming here for protection.”

“But Finn said the Order has hundreds.”

“We know how to protect ourselves,” Leia laughs, only a little giddy with grief. “I am not giving up on my home or my family.”

Rey can only nod, giving her alpha a hug that is returned without reticence. Leia’s particular notes are aspen and primrose, and her small frame feels like home. Rey had never known her mother, but Leia is better—someone to protect, but not to get attached to. She’s seen packs fall before. She’s helped tear them down, with her own teeth and claws. All her instincts are telling her to run but she remains. That has to mean something.

The force rising against them is too big, too strong, but Leia is right in that they can at least remain human when they need to, and take shelter in the house and protected acres until they pass over them. By all accounts, the snows will be here sooner than expected, and then they can retreat by choice. At least, that’s what Rey tells herself.

Until winter comes too soon.


	2. Poison Tree

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Take away my blood and bones_  
>  _Make your flowers deep inside of me_  
>  _Least I'll still have company_  
>  _My inside, tiny poison tree_  
>  _I'll seal my love in me_  
>  _Tiny beautiful poison tree_  
>     
>  _Oh beautiful poison tree, let your power grow in me_  
>  _Let your sorrows sow in me_  
>  _Turn me into a poison tree_  
>  __  
>  _Make my shadow go away_  
>  _Make my branches strong and hard_  
>  _Make my leaves flower and spread_  
>  _Make me feel like something powerful is growing deep inside of me_  
>  _Turn me into a poison tree_  
>  __  
> [\- Grouper “Poison Tree”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3X5stzhyS40)  
>  __

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  
> 
>  
> 
> _It was right that we did meet each other in each other’s eyes_  
>  _It was right that we did see each other in our shadow sides_  
>  _It was wrong then too that crazy love, loves crazy as it does_  
>  _And each of us and both of us so crazy, as it was_  
>     
>  _You were right on time to break your head and make the death bed_  
>  _You were right on time to crash those galaxies and flat-line_  
>  _You were right on time to make the light inside of me a life_  
>  _You were right on time to meet me, crazy love, and watch us die_  
>     
>  _Who else is going to love someone like you, that’s marked for death?_  
>  _Who else is going to be with you when you breathe your last?_  
>  _Who else is going to take my place and hold and keep you safe?_  
>  _Who else would ever stay?_  
>     
> \- [Emma Ruth Rundle “Marked For Death”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H8xSaqLVzUA)
> 
>  
> 
> * * *
> 
> Everyone go thank my beta [caisha](https://archiveofourown.org/users/caisha/pseuds/caisha) aka [reylosource](http://reylosource.tumblr.com/) on tumblr for adding so much to this chapter.
> 
> [There's a dark atmospheric metal playlist for this](https://open.spotify.com/user/126963742/playlist/5j1JI5OOMza7n165j8B6lK?si=jqQk-zFVQ5qRGp9Lz9V3Sw) if you like that sort of thing.

Running patrols is exhausting, and after almost a month of silence and the absence of signs they reduce the numbers to two wolves only, keeping watch on the boundaries and checking for new scents. The evidence the Order is closing in on them are here and there—confused by human history and the industrial-grade mixtures that hunters use against prey. It’s just enough to make them wary, not enough to keep them afraid. 

Rey is playing a game of checkers with Finn for the hundredth time, laughing at his inability to beat her double-stacked foes, when the scream fractures the night. Her limbs immediately go hot and itchy, the fight response kicking into gear as she knocks over the board and runs to the back door.

It’s below freezing and yet the hot, corroded taste of despair hangs over Leia, who’s on her hands and knees on the deck in front of her favorite chair, blanket strewn like a white flag 

“It’s Han,” she says, not looking up. “Don’t go, don’t go.”

Rey turns back to Finn but he’s already down on the ground, changing so rapidly his clothes are an afterthought. The air distorts and ripples with the endothermic reaction, pulling in all the heat so the temperature drops further and his white coat manifests like frost across his dark skin. She lets the surge of warmth within her follow his, the fire burning her from the inside-out as her limbs and muscles expand. The change never hurts, but when the wolf’s brain shutters into place behind her eyes the keening noise from her alpha is a high-pitched tone in her head and her panic is thick enough to taste. 

Rey nuzzles at the older woman’s brown hair as comfort—Leia has not been able to change in years and cannot run with them—before streaking across the snow-dusted grass towards the sentinel wall of trees, Finn at her haunches. 

_North_ , Finn whines aloud as he speaks through their mental link. _I can smell blood._

The air is still and the night is moonless but they follow the fresh bloom of that familiar smell. They’re almost at the edge of the property, circled by a stream running under a frozen layer of ice, when the night is cracked by a familiar sound. The report of a high-caliber rifle stuns them both, Rey’s pads kicking up brush and snow as she skids to a stop at the edge of the forest.

A gray form lies still in the vast clearing. Another wolf, hulking and black, is staggering across the field away from the body, trailing a torrent of dark blood. Rey can taste him like her mouth is full of pennies, the saliva dripping from her jaws. She would know that shape anywhere.

A too-tall figure leaves the treeline a hundred yards away, lowering his weapon. Han’s beta, Chewie, is easy to recognize as he runs towards the fallen wolf, making garbled noises with a mouth that has never been able to speak in a human way, forever trapped between forms. 

There’s no time to make sure Han is okay, or to work out the complications of communicating with Chewie even if she’s the only one who can understand him. She sprints after the retreating enemy, now behind Finn. Her friend hasn’t stopped, white tail tucked low as he dashes towards the wolf retreating across the frozen field. 

He reaches the Alpha before she can. Finn’s ivory-colored form jumps and twists, immediately going for the throat. But their enemy is much larger, and desperate. Black paws rise up and knock the smaller wolf to the ground, rolling over him. The Alpha’s jaws bury in Finn’s nape, shaking his body to and fro, tortured yelps echoing through the night. Rey launches herself at his exposed flank.

He’s caught off guard as she climbs up his frame, her teeth sinking into his shoulder. Rey’s feet scrabble at his back as she finds a grip, tearing muscle and black fur free in a spray of blood that stings her eyes and coats her muzzle. The Alpha is knocked down to his belly beneath her weight, unable to buck her off when she fights to crack the vertebrae buried beneath his thick ruff and corded muscle.

When he finally snaps back at her she darts away from his furious snarls, grabbing onto his right hindquarter to try to pull him from Finn’s body. He kicks free, swirling in the snow and earth to attack her. It’s easy to underestimate his speed by how large he is; in an instant he knocks her down, his enormous weight on top of her so she’s on her back, throat and belly exposed.

 _Submit_ , he orders in a pain-stricken voice, his bloodied teeth inches from her eyes. 

_Never_ , Rey roars through his mind. This was not like before, now he’d attacked _her_ alpha and she knew well how to resist his allure in defense of her pack. The snow at her back melts as she lessens her hold on her form, allowing a fragment of the human back in. In a heartbeat the blunt-edged paws currently hanging useless stretch into razor-sharp claws. She sinks them into his face and shoulder to find purchase, her canines digging into the rough layer of fur where his neck meets his skull. Her bite isn’t big enough to circle even a quarter of his neck, but each swipe of her claws and teeth part his flesh.

He goes strangely still beneath her efforts to tear his carotid free of his throat. Rey swallows hot blood as another gunshot cracks the air—this one much closer. She finally lets go. There’s something wrong, some primal change happening inside as she clambers back on the awkward half-wolf, half-human legs of her _crinos_ form. Her vision is blurring, heart slowing, and she can barely keep from planting face-first into the ground between them.

He’s changing too, dark fur receding into skin as he tries to pull himself away. He collapses to look back at her, shadowed by the lights of cars approaching behind him. She knows she needs to run forward and finish what she started before they get too close. She needs to bury her teeth in that weakened flesh, but she can barely move. Blood drips from her open jaws, tasting like heaven and hell combined as the taste of _him_ saturates her tongue. Wood, whiskey, musk . . . and something else. 

The Alpha’s hidden shape resolves as gunshots break the night. His human eyes are impossibly dark, his black hair lank from the residual heat and moisture of the transformation. Those features are hauntingly familiar, now that she can connect him to his parents—recognizing it in the many times she’d seen the same pain in their faces. With each bullet that whizzes past she senses his scent spike with fear. Somehow she knows it’s not for him, but for _her._

“Run.” 

His voice is the same, but now he looks like a scared boy—his quick breaths visible as clouds in the headlights. The wounds in his torso and neck gush red with each heartbeat. 

Rey feels an unwelcome surge of regret at the sight of him like this. It floods through her, along with the sudden, insane idea that she needs to help him—this person who had attacked her own. She wants to stand over him and keep him safe from both sides. No shaking of her wolf’s skull can clear it. His scent roils inside of her and she can hardly contain the instinct to lunge towards him again, this time not with anger, but something new. 

_She needs to protect him._

“Freechanger.” His head lolls across his arm, a dark line appearing from the corner of his mouth to travel down his chin. She realizes distantly that the wounds aren’t closing, that he’s dying. Chewie must have used a silver round. The effects are with her, too, his blood in her belly and the madness setting in with it. Every inch of her is telling her to run and pry the shot out of his wound, to save him from certain death, even as another bullet kicks up a splash of icy soil a foot from her head.

 _“Omega,”_ he grinds out a warning and it shakes her loose of the hold. She shifts back to full _lupus_ , ducking and weaving against another hail of gunfire. The flicker of illuminated eyes in the trees means she’s not alone, but it’s still just her and Finn on the field. She stops to nudge his head with her own, his breathing shallow but still present. He’s alive, barely. The toxin of the silver would keep him from healing just as much as it had the one who’d bit him . . . and her.

With a surge of resolve, she turns and bares her teeth at impending death, her friend’s crimson-stained body at her feet. She will die here, with her pack, if need be. 

And yet, there’s no battle, no sacrifice. The Order retrieve the limp body of the Alpha while two, smaller wolves pace in the headlights: a great silver thing and a smaller, red creature. They howl a threat, their human companions firing warning shots in the air before retreating to their all-terrain vehicles. The diesel and metal smell fades away long before the howls of the Organa pack answer. 

There’s no defiance in the song, just mourning. The pack finds Han’s body is still a wolf, and will always be. They call it the Blessing: death in battle with another alpha allowing him to hunt forever. But he’s still just another carcass in the snow, and Leia mourns not only her husband but the son who’d torn his father’s heart out with his teeth.

* * *

Rey tastes him on her tongue for months afterwards, long after she’d worked the silver out of her system, curled in bed for days with a deep ache inside. No matter what she eats, it’s ash in her mouth compared to the sweetness of the death she’d almost given him. She can’t tell anyone that it had tasted better than anything she’d ever tried, afraid of what they’d say or think. 

The Hunger had found her as a child, but she’d starved instead. There was no food for a small one like herself, besides the occasional dumb rabbit or squirrel dragged off the road after fighting the crows for it. And so she’d learned to wait and go without. She’d had her first human meal at five when she’d been lured into Plutt’s raggedy band of wolves with the promise of food not begged or stolen. That’s when she’d learned there were some things worse than starvation.

So when she’d scented traces of him on the brambles of a dying blackberry thicket, Rey had kept it to herself. She’s sure Rose had smelled him, but the little wolf had kept quiet—perhaps a little too comfortable with her territory considering she’d lived with the Holdo clan in this place for a long time. Leia had taken her own to their packlands in the mountains of Northern California when the season had changed, and they’d all felt a little safer being so far away.

And yet, here he is, making that insidious hunger rise up inside of her all over again, his scent leading her into temptation.

 _Leave this place_ , she wills the words into the night around her, forgetting her comrades are nearby and listening.

 _I’m not leaving_ , Rose answers back—still within proximity. 

Rey would die of embarrassment if it wasn’t for the answering response from Finn: _I’m not getting anything. We should go back to Poe._

 _Don’t wait for me_ , Rey shoots back. She senses their hesitation as they speak to one another in silence before retreating. Pair bonding is still a foreign thing to her. In her limited experience, the ability to speak via mind has always been to signal intent to the pack or another wolf in scent range.

 _Don’t stay here alone_ , _Rey_. 

Rose’s voice fades as they run back to the borders to make up for lost ground.

This is her fight, she knows. After watching Finn spend a week bound to a metal table, poisoned by the miniscule amount of silver transmitted through a bite to his spine, she could never ask her friends to follow her into folly. Especially not Rose, tiny but spirited enough that she would fight an army regardless of their status as low-ranked. She’d been the first packmate who shared their designation, and had taught her it wasn’t wrong to be the word she could not yet even say.

“Fuck whatever they want to call us,” Rose had told her while hanging out of the hood of a truck, wrestling out engine parts. “We didn’t choose it. We still have a choice in who we are.” 

_Choice._ The word would not be so funny if she wasn’t slinking through the forest towards a memory, a need to protect and scent pushing her onwards. The rainfall threatening to break throughout the afternoon is now sending splatters of moisture down leaves and tree branches to splash across her back. She almost wished it would wash away the notes of fresh sap that are his calling card, so that she could be free again. But the scent lingers preternaturally.

She travels a long time, and by then there are other smells: corrosive kerosene, the plastic of man-made devices. The cameras mounted just out of reach on the trees, hidden behind branches, are obvious long before she sniffs at them on her hind legs. Bitter cigarette butts and shell casings scattered on the ground tell her these are the worst kind of men—along with the fear and the substances they’ve been abusing fresh in the urine they’d splashed into the bushes. 

_Kylo?_

She risks his name now that she cannot sense her companions. Of course she knows it, after everything. Leia had never told her, but the others spoke of him in hushed tones, even in telepathy.

 _Why are you here?_

His response vibrates through her frame, and she holds still as her nose dips in the air, reaching for that scent again. She thinks it might be a few hours old. He’s somewhere, but not here. Close.

 _Hunting you,_ she threatens. It’s the worst response she could have given despite thinking of it beforehand. She’d known he was alive—at least a part of him—but hadn’t really believed he’d answer.

 _Hunting as well_ , he admits. His tone tells her that he knows she’s lying, but she can’t let on that there’s an alternative. 

_Me?_ Rey asks.

 _Other things._ There’s that same voice: a dry, cracking tone beneath the savagery. _I know exactly where you are, why would I need to hunt you?_

 _You want me to rip out your throat a second time?_ The threat is empty, a distraction at best. Moving forward, she captures the sound of men laughing, the swampish smell of unharvested cannabis.

_You can try._

_Are you afraid?_ Rey taunts, memories flitting about her buzzing skull of sinking her teeth into his fur, the submission he’d given her that hadn’t seemed entirely injury-related.

A long silence hangs over her before he responds: _You’ll need to go left at the tree with the peeling bark. There’s a row of trailers. No one will recognize you if you’re human. Or wolf._

She balks at the invitation, ready to run all the way back to the city. It’s a trap . . . but then why would he need to trap her? She can’t smell another of their kind here beside her companions. Rey runs through the equations as that nagging thought at the back of her mind tells her _follow, follow, you need him,_ making the blood in her veins turn molten. 

She fights the feeling, all the while looking for a tree with peeling bark. She knows this species—the one they called a madrona. It's easy to identify, red fibers exposed beneath the gray-white of dying limbs. When she finds his scent again it’s human, tainted by aftershave, shampoo, deodorant. The products are all unscented but their chemical composition is heady in the way they’re still utterly and completely _him_. And fresh.

Now that she’s tracking a man she abandons telepathy for silence, skulking around the first trailer to follow his traces. It doesn’t take long to find where he lives, drawn by the residue of his handprints on a door handle. She creeps up, noiselessly, right as the door is thrown open. His shadow fills the entire entrance and for the first time she understands his size is just as intimidating when he’s a human.

They stare at each other, neither one reacting as the heavy implication of her arrival swirls around them. He steps aside, watching with hawk-like intensity as she ghosts up the metal stairs past him into the tiny space. She curls in the far corner of the room, waiting, strangely calm. His presence, written into every moment he’d spent in this temporary shelter, is overwhelming. Rationality screams at her to bolt out past him into the night as every other part of her settles into his territory. It should feel like the enemy’s lair, but to the wolf it’s safety. Maybe even sanctuary. 

It takes a few seconds for him to search the night, warily, before he turns back and closes the door without saying a word. Kylo slides onto a couch across from the corner she’d claimed as her own and they sit, man and wolf, regarding each other in the relative darkness for a long time. 

Sometime later he clicks on a small electric lantern at his side, illuminating a face scored with deep fractures. It’s one she knows all too well, for how often she’d seen it behind her eyelids. He’s dressed simply: black shirt and jeans, a tactical holster empty on his shoulders. He sighs deeply into their loaded silence and rubs his face with both hands before disappearing into the back room to grab a bundle of fabric that he throws on the low-pile carpet in front of her nose.

“Put that on,” he says, his dulcet voice soothing. “If you want to.” The qualification of choice makes her pause, remembering how he had attempted to assert his dominance in their first meeting. She shoves the memory of him _letting her go_ away, focusing on the dangers of trusting an Alpha.

He leaves again, allowing her privacy. There’s a small kitchen with empty counters, and a low couch. A card table in front of her is covered in documents, which she can’t see until she pushes herself back into human form, sweating profusely from the change. She wipes herself clean with a towel she finds in the laundry, slightly surprised at his thoughtfulness, before drawing an over-large t-shirt down across her shoulders and nothing else. Beneath the detergent he’d washed it in is his scent, and she’s compelled to roll up in the pile and rub it all over her. It had taken weeks for his scent to fade from her the first time; it had been months before she could pretend she didn’t miss it. 

“I’m done,” she says softly once she’s sat down on the couch in his place, calling him back into the low-lit room. His residual warmth is still in the scratchy upholstery of the couch against the part of her thighs not covered by his shirt. She holds her legs tightly together with a surge of unfamiliar self-consciousness as he returns, pausing in the kitchen to keep a safe distance. 

With his face lit she thinks she can see the wildness in his eyes, the flaring of his nostrils as he takes her human form in for the first time. She’d thought he’d see the woman beneath the wolf and find weakness, but he treats her as if she were a threat; he looks away, throat bobbing and jaw working against some inner discomfort. 

Rey’s confidence grows as he turns away from her and runs a hand through his dark hair to reveal her mark, the deep line running from his right eyebrow to snake across his face and throat. It winds down beneath the collar of his shirt, accompanied by the smaller, uglier scars she’d made with teeth and claws. 

The silver bullet had done its work: he would never heal from the wounds she’d inflicted. There’s a flare of pride under her breast at the sight, and she watches him straighten a little at her scrutiny, as if maybe he was proud of it, too. She had wanted to hurt him that night, and _oh_ how she hoped it continued to hurt to look into a mirror and see a handsome face so broken by her touch. 

“Why did you kill him?” Her voice is steady, the righteous anger she’d held onto for months infusing the words she’d waited so long to ask.

“I had to,” he says, softly, eyes dropping away from hers at the confession. It’s a sign of submission, as heady as the aroma coming from his clothing. Her pulse quickens, imagining what else he would submit to. She shakes the traitorous thoughts away, continuing to glare at him despite the heat rising to her cheekbones.

“Why did you hate him?” she asks. She couldn’t even remember who’d whelped her, who’d left her in the forest to fend on her own, but she could never understand killing one’s father.

“I didn’t.” 

His fingers are gripping the linoleum of the counter, flexing continuously, the sinews of his muscles rippling with the action, and she almost cautions him to not destroy it like she knows he wants to. She holds back, understanding she shouldn’t care whether he destroys it or not.

“Look at me,” Rey orders. His eyes flick up, seeing her. His body is fixed in place as surely as hers had been in their first meeting, that fresh-cut wood and musky smell enclosing the room. 

“Why did you scent-mark me when we met?” she asks.

“Because I thought you were mine.” He says it so simply, as if the answer should have been obvious to her. His expression is open, telling—imploring her to understand the desperation of a true Alpha when he meets his— _no_ , that’s a trail she refuses to follow. She shakes off the thought, staring him down and working to keep her face impassive.

It’s a strange thing, looking into another wolf’s eyes for a long time without them trying to kill her. It’s . . . unusual. Any one of his kind would take it as an act of provocation, but their gazes remain held, each one needing the other to see _something._ For all the world they’re still strangers to one another, but it doesn’t feel that way as Rey’s fights to come back up from the dark daydream of being his, of surrendering to a word she’d never given much consideration to: _mine_.

“I’m not yours.” Her voice wavers. There’s a small part of her mind that doesn’t believe her own words, reminding her in a sly whisper how she came to him, how she’d _submitted_. 

“You’re not mine,” Kylo agrees, repeating her words—attempting to soothe her, she thinks. He ducks his chin, eyebrows raising. “But I’m yours.”

It’s such a ridiculous statement, and yet it makes her heartbeat pound in her ears until she can hear nothing else. His body makes no movement towards her, and his words make no demand. There’s just a simple acknowledgement of what’s happening, why he’s here.

“You don’t even know me,” she says, ignoring the whisper that he might want to know something about her. The last shreds of her composure hold. “How could you ever think I’d want you.”

The words are harsh, but he simply edges forward, only so far, not quite filling the space as he crouches down to meet her eyes. His are much closer to the wolf’s in the light, flecks of black in the amber-colored irises, and she finds herself swallowing under their intensity. _True Alpha, indeed._

“You had your chance to kill me,” he says. “But you didn’t. Couldn’t. I owe you a life debt.” The back of her mind is still snagged on the other facet of this meeting: why neither of them have mentioned what else is rumbling between them, why she’d run here to lie down on his floor and saturate in his scent.

“I don’t want you,” she says, but corrects herself quickly, “I don’t want you to owe me.”

Her shoulders roll back in defiance and he watches her for a moment before returning to the kitchen, rummaging around and pulling open drawers. 

“Alright, I’ll make it easy for you then,” he says once he’s standing in front of her, handing her a bundle wrapped in a white dishcloth.

She takes it, eyeing him warily. Wrapped in the towel is a silver table knife with a sharp point and a keen edge, an antique by how it’s tarnished dark by time. The metal burns her nose, making her cough and sneeze until she holds it away from her, remembering the trauma of her last experience with a silver-tainted. Mere atoms, contained in a bite carried in liters of blood, had crippled her for weeks.

“I could just rip out your throat, again,” she says, trying to remain casual about the fact that he’d just offered to let her kill him.

“It’s more effective if you put it between my third and fourth ribs first. Left side.” He touches her hand and she flinches at their first skin-to-skin contact, his hands like fire against hers when he brings her arm and the blade up to point at his wide torso. His long, gentle fingers help to angle hers. The knife’s tip wavers as Rey looks between it and his unreadable face, panic coursing through her at the thought of hurting him. 

“Fuck you,” she spits after a moment, ripping her hand away from his too-hot grasp. “You don’t need me to kill you, you _coward_. Melt this down into a bullet and use your gun if you’re so eager to die.”

She watches as he kneels down in front of her in yet another gesture of submission. “I need you to tell me to do it, if that’s what you want.”

A chill runs up her body at his words, and she finds herself with her free arm wrapped around her even though she hasn’t felt the cold in a while, not with the heat his body is giving off. Something is clawing its way out of her chest, and she can’t tell if it’s telling her to thrust the knife into him like he’d asked or drop it at their feet and run her hands up his neck and into the curls of hair brushing against it.

“You don’t need me to tell you,” Rey’s voice quivers slightly. 

She watches as his hands flex on his thighs, his eyes glassy when they find hers again. “No one ever explained what happens when we find one of you?”

 _One of you._ That phrase slides around her head, the word— _association—_ she had always rejected, Rose’s voice telling her that they still had a choice.

“You order us around and . . . and make us do things we don’t want to.” Rey hates that her hands are shaking so noticeably, that her eyes and nose are beginning to run. 

He exhales through his nostrils in amusement, startling her. 

“It isn’t like that—at all.”

“You made me submit.” She wipes at her face, wondering if she’s crying because of the acrid smell of silver or the unearthed emotions bubbling up in her chest. The conflict inside her swells, the need to be _free_ warring with the impulse to sink down from the couch and rest her head against his solid, delicious-smelling frame. 

“You resisted it the other time. Or did you forget?” He turns his head as he speaks, watching her closely. “You don’t follow my orders; I follow yours. I can’t make you do anything, and I can’t do anything you don’t want me to. I’m yours.”

There’s that phrase again, his eyes burning into her. He’s not looking at her like she’s a threat anymore—not even an enemy. Terror rises up in her stomach as she realizes that he means it.

On impulse she gets up to go to the door, opening it and throwing the knife and towel outside before closing it so hard the trailer shudders. She’s grateful for the distraction and the absence of the silver—until she feels him stand, moving behind her. 

Then he’s so near again she can taste him, like licking a saw-blade after it’s cut through lumber. When she turns it takes everything in her power to stop from running her hands up his chest, her short nails ripping the fabric as they go, wanting to sink deeper into his skin. The skin she’d marked before, and wanted to again. Rey remembers his shape in the snow: the black fur beneath the surface of that sun-starved pallor. Is it wrong of her to wonder what _that_ would feel like beneath her fingertips?

“You need help,” she murmurs to herself, staring at the ground between them. 

“Yes,” he breathes, “I do.”

“I can’t be this for you,” she shakes her head. That first night she’d scrubbed at herself for hours trying to erase his scent, only the memory of him had seeped into her pillow from her wet hair. It had haunted her in dreams of meeting again—nameless fantasies of letting their skins disappear to rub cheek to cheek, in the flesh. He’d been faceless, nameless, then. Just a wolf and an enemy.

Then there were the other dreams— the ones that had come after she’d buried herself in his neck, overdosing on his blood. She’d worked out the silver toxicity in a feverish haze, her lunatic’s brain imagining him tending to her, comforting her. In her sickness she’d touched herself to the thought of comforting him while he lay bleeding in the snow. Later, when she didn’t have the silver to blame, she’d brought herself to a peak of desire with just what remained of his scent in her pillow-down, a deep voice in her head telling her to _submit_. The same voice that had ordered her to _run._

“I’m not yours.” Rey repeats, pacing back and forth in front of him in his tiny trailer. Her skin is on fire and there’s an embarrassing clenching in the muscles of her belly as she recalls wishing she could breathe in his smell every hour, every minute. “You’re going to have to forget about me and go back to your life, and leave me alone.”

“That’s not possible,” he says. His surety makes her think she may as well have told him to reverse the rotation of the planet. Then he’s standing over her—too large, his face wracked by the very thing she knows is making her pulse stutter and her body vibrate with the anticipation of touch. 

“Then I’ll kill you,” she growls out a threat. It’s empty—sad even—considering the way she’s on tiptoe, craning her neck and still not tall enough to meet him nose to nose. Rey’s hands curl into fists to keep from touching him.

“By all means,” he says as he spreads his open palms in front of her. When she doesn’t flinch he lifts his hands to frame her face, fingertips ghosting the skin. It’s controlled, gentle. She trembles against another rush of unanticipated arousal. “But don’t deny that this . . . whatever it is . . . makes that exceedingly difficult.”

“It can be broken,” she protests. Her body tells her otherwise. It had been so long since she’d been touched by someone that she doesn’t just want it, she needs it. Goosebumps rise on her arms as he tests the waters with each tentative gesture, thumbs stroking through the wild strands of hair at her temples.

“Biology will betray you, every time,” his fingers slide beneath her hair to the back of her neck, teasing the place she’d always cursed long before she knew what it was. His touch circles the rough skin near her spine until she’s swaying on her feet, blood singing as it courses through her. When he finally stops the last shred of her logical mind kicks into overdrive. She shoves him away with two hands, unable to snarl or yell at him—not with disappointment needling her every nerve. 

He laughs coldly in response. “Fight it, if you want, but don’t deny it exists. I can’t. I have no choice but to protect you.” 

He seethes for a moment, face twitching. “You, of all people.” He moves towards her again, but she holds her hands out to stop him, her human brain attempting to process what he’d just confessed.

 

“You want to protect me?” 

She breathes heavily, the wolf intruding on her thoughts, as satisfied as when she’s slept as _lupus_ , body-to-body with a half-dozen others. She shoves the animal back down, rejecting the feeling of comfort. 

“It’s not a want. It’s a need, don’t you understand?” He’s imploring her, but she doesn’t budge. Rey scoffs, moving back. 

“Sort yourself out, and leave me alone. I don’t want any part of this.”

He moves in towards her, forcing her to look up in his brown eyes. “Then why are you here? You didn’t even hesitate.” 

She swallows, her back against the door, watching his eyes roam her face as he waits for an answer. “I . . . I don’t know.”

He places his hands on either side of her face again, leaning down, only inches between them. 

“Say it, Rey.”

Her body jerks when he says her name, unable to remember when she’d told him. He leans back and she releases a breath she didn’t know she was holding onto.

“When we met we didn’t have your profile. I thought you were a stray, or feral. Probably unfamiliar with our kind by your suicidal attempt to fight me,” he turns his head to smirk at her and she narrows her eyes. Sighing, he continues, “It wasn’t until I smelled my . . . that I knew you were with them.” 

His jaw tightens. “By then it was too late. You were everywhere. I couldn’t walk within a mile of a bakery or a florist without thinking about your stupid scent. Figuring out who you were wasn’t hard, but I stayed away, didn’t I?”

“You don’t know me,” she cringes at how petulant she sounds, but she knows it to be true. “You don’t have the right to know anything about me just because you _claim_ to be mine.”

He looks at her incredulously. “How can you still stand there and deny it? You _bit_ me. There’s a ritual in biting that you obviously weren’t aware of-”

He stops talking at that, his eyes sharpening. When he speaks again, his voice is lower, “Or did you, Rey?” 

Her name on his tongue makes her shudder as he leans down, running his nose along the pulse point of her neck, drinking deeply of her scent. 

“Did you know what you were doing when you sank your teeth into my neck? Did you think your instincts were just to _fight_ me?” His breath fans across the shell of her ear, and the thread of desire roiling up from her belly ignites into a wildfire. 

“Or did you _want_ to _mate_ me?”

The word should have made her scream, pummel him with her fists. But she’s a livewire of need, small noises rising and dying in the back of her throat. She shifts her legs slightly, the heat from his body amplifying the taste of him on the air. It’s drowning her, washing out almost all reason as his hair tickles her jawline. If it’s wrong that she wants it, she knows it’s worse that she’s telegraphing it through the relaxation of her limbs and the sudden wetness between her legs. He takes one last pass across her throat before straightening up and backing away.

”But I guess it doesn’t matter, does it? You took my choice away,” he says, and still she doesn’t sense any resentment in his faltering voice. “So don’t think I don’t know what you’re going through.”

“How do you know my name?” she changes the subject, unable to process the energy storm in the few feet between them, the one that has her back pressed against the door.

“You know who I work for.” 

“You kill men. And eat them,” she says. “That doesn’t answer my question, though.”

“Kill, yes. But there’s only one who eats them.” At that she raises her eyebrows in surprise; everyone had told her the Order were man-eaters. Finn, who’d been part of one of their many units before fleeing, had claimed it to be true. 

“But you hunt for them.” Rey’s voice is hard.

“I do.” 

“You killed your father for them.”

“I gave him the best death I could. It was him, or the pack. A test that I couldn’t fail. He would have chosen the same, to die for his own, if he was forced to.” He’s no longer fixated on her eyes, his sad gaze on her mouth. 

“You’re still a kin-killer,” she seethes, remembering why she was so angry with him to begin with. Violence has never frightened her, even murder under the right circumstances. But killing one’s own flesh and blood is beyond the pale. It’s a stain he will never wash away, one that can’t be forgiven. She feels nauseated that she’s let him touch her, considering even now reaching across the space to explore him with her hands.

He seems to read her thoughts because he steps back, wounded. “I know that, Rey.”

“I’m leaving,” she says, ignoring his pleading eyes. She can’t bring herself to stay any longer, fearful of what she might do. She isn’t afraid of violence, but this—this is something else entirely. “If you attack us again, I won’t stop.”

“I’m just here to observe,” he holds his hands up at her warning. “I’m alone. I promise.”

“Good,” she says, taking him at his word. She removes the shirt he had given her, silently whimpering at the loss of the cocoon of his leather-and-cedar scent. She keeps her eyes locked onto his, noting how he swallows, managing not to look down at her body as she changes.

He’s unable to move until she nudges at the door with her muzzle. When it’s open she doesn’t spare a look back, afraid that the intoxicating scent—something like the woods on a warm day—will keep her there. She won’t let her wolf betray her, and the thought keeps her from turning around and winding her way between his legs back into the shelter. Kylo waits for her to go, a flexed arm holding his wide torso up against the doorframe. The howl threatening to rip from her chest as she sprints away is one of mourning—a cry to not be left alone.

It takes her an half-hour to find a suitable spot in a nearby creek to roll around in the mud and wash off, praying there’s no leeches. She coats her fur in the thick clay, then stands under a frigid cascade of water overflowing from an interconnected wall of branches and stones so that the rush of water cancels everything else. Again, and again—rinse, repeat. But his touch is still there whether she’s wolf or human: a scarlet brand. Only Leia and Finn will know, she thinks. Maybe if she avoids them both for a few days of scrubbing agan they won’t find out. 

She takes one last dunk in the creek, washing her body beneath the sluice pouring from a hollowed-out log. That’s when she feels an unfamiliar sensation in her skull, like the satisfying opening of a tumbler in a picked lock.

 _Rey_ , he says in her head, distantly. The thrill courses through her body, making it shake uncontrollably with need.

She doesn’t answer. 


	3. Hungry, Thirsty

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> [Cross Record’s “Hungry, Thirsty”](https://crossrecord.bandcamp.com/track/hungry-thirsty)
> 
> (Exactly what it says on the tin.)
> 
> Next chapter to follow in a few days, since we’re getting to the fun part.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  
> 
>  
> 
> _It was right that we did meet each other in each other’s eyes_  
>  _It was right that we did see each other in our shadow sides_  
>  _It was wrong then too that crazy love, loves crazy as it does_  
>  _And each of us and both of us so crazy, as it was_  
>     
>  _You were right on time to break your head and make the death bed_  
>  _You were right on time to crash those galaxies and flat-line_  
>  _You were right on time to make the light inside of me a life_  
>  _You were right on time to meet me, crazy love, and watch us die_  
>     
>  _Who else is going to love someone like you, that’s marked for death?_  
>  _Who else is going to be with you when you breathe your last?_  
>  _Who else is going to take my place and hold and keep you safe?_  
>  _Who else would ever stay?_  
>     
> \- [Emma Ruth Rundle “Marked For Death”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H8xSaqLVzUA)
> 
> * * *
> 
> Everyone go thank my beta [caisha](https://archiveofourown.org/users/caisha/pseuds/caisha) aka [reylosource](http://reylosource.tumblr.com/) on tumblr for adding so much to this chapter.
> 
> [There's a dark atmospheric metal playlist for this](https://open.spotify.com/user/126963742/playlist/5j1JI5OOMza7n165j8B6lK?si=jqQk-zFVQ5qRGp9Lz9V3Sw) if you like that sort of thing.

The fever starts before she’s even back to the house. It’s warm for fall but it feels like her fur has begun to freeze in how the wetness contrasts to the burning of her skin. When she’s back inside, wrapping herself in one of the many flannel robes left by the door, she’s greeted by Rose and her sister Paige sitting in the living room.

“Rey you were gone forever, Finn is out looking for you.”

“Call him back,” Rey says between clacking teeth. “I stumbled on an illegal weed farm, didn’t get caught. But they have guns, cameras.”

Paige shares a look with her sister before running out the door. Like most cross-humans, Rose won’t be able to change back as easily after a day in _lupus_ , so is forced to remain with Rey. The transition is difficult without the recuperation time that Rey has been lucky to always find unnecessary as a full shifter, the thing they called a freechanger. She shivers, remembering how Kylo had breathed out that word as he lay on the ground bleeding from wounds she gave him. 

Even if Leia hadn’t told her that he shared the gift, she would have known then. It would have been better to not know, considering the nights she’d lingered on the thought of what he looked like in his in-between shape, the thought which had begun looping through her mind long before she’d returned to the house.

“What’s wrong?” Rose asks, wrapping her in a woolen blanket. Her small hands rub Rey’s shoulders, concern wrought in her large, dark eyes. Rose’s nose wrinkles slightly at something before she shakes her head and pushes her towards their shared room. 

“Just caught a chill, I think,” Rey coughs out. “Had to wash off some poison oak in the creek.”

Rose doesn’t say anything until the door is closed, looking at Rey hunched over on the bottom bunk as she drops her blanket, suddenly hot again. The temperature changes are like a tide shifting every few minutes: one minute the room is arctic, the next it’s blistering. It was unlike anything she had ever felt before.

“Rey, you’ve gone into heat before, haven’t you?” she asks, as quietly as she can. 

“What are you on about?” Rey scoots back, avoiding her friend’s knowing eyes. She knows about mating of course, the urge to rut that comes in early spring when the wolf’s nature demands new additions to the pack. But it’s never been accompanied by sickness before, nor the burning that slithers across and underneath her skin, settling in the pit of her stomach. 

Rose doesn’t have to swoop far to join her on the bunk, hands wrapping around her own even though Rey is sitting there sweating and half-naked. 

Rose whispers, “It’s an omega thing. Not like mating really, it’s...triggered.” She pauses, shifting slightly as if unsure whether to explain more. “Your body is attuned to finding an Alpha and when it finds the one you’re meant for, it . . . there’s a switch that flips, basically.”

 _I’m yours._ Rey remembers his words from earlier, the pull towards his body at close quarters, the things he said—about _marking._

“No, no. No.” Rey repeats it over and over, pulling a pillow to her face to hide from the truth surrounding and closing in on her. “This isn’t happening. Why is this happening to me?”

“It’s natural. Don’t worry. We’ll have to keep you isolated so you don’t hump the furniture or make the others start killing each other over you, but really it’s pretty fun. Especially if you have more than one partner,” she consoles her by beaming brightly, eyes staring off into space dreamily. “And it only lasts a week, so you’ll be back hunting with us in no time.”

Rey muffles her scream in the pillow, but it echoes off the walls. Soon someone is knocking on the door.

“Is everything alright in there?” Holdo’s voice carries through the door. Rey looks up to shake her head but Rose has already opened it. The older woman enters, glass of pink rosé in hand, to observe the scene. 

“Smells like summer of ‘97 in here,” the tall woman laughs. Holdo is the second Alpha Rey has ever met, and her scent is an alluring mixture of lavender ice cream and—as Rose had once observed—india ink. 

“She’s going into _you-know-what_ ,” Rose says, suddenly shy around the older woman. 

“Obviously. Is this your first time, Rey?” Holdo asks, her voice gentling. “You don’t have to be embarrassed.”

“I’m not embarrassed,” Rey says, licking her lips to will away the dryness forming there. “I’m going to die.”

Holdo shakes her head, fuschia-dyed hair swinging. “Don’t be. It’s natural. Like eating raw elk tongue. It’s absolutely magical.”

“Can you help her?” Rose asks, her tan skin turning a deep shade of crimson when she realizes the double-meaning. Holdo giggles melodically, her lithe frame bending like a willow. 

“In another era, maybe,” she shrugs, wiping a tear from her eyes. “But no. I’ll book a cabin. I know a few spots out here—sometimes you need an escape when you have a retreat, not just for things like this. We should be able to get a good spot by the lake since it’s off-season. You’re going to need the cold water.” 

“Please don’t tell Leia,” Rey begs, hands fisting in the scratchy bed-cover. 

“I won’t need to, honey. This house is already starting to smell like the best cinnamon rolls in the world and everyone is going to want to take a bite. And I mean _everyone_.” 

Holdo’s platinum bangles clack as she pulls a phone out from the pocket of her silk robe, typing with one long-nailed thumb before looking up. “You should also consider roping in a fuck buddy. It will make things easier.”

With that she’s out of the room, closing the door behind her but still laughing to herself.

Rey whines and considers running for the hills, literally. It only gets worse when Rose turns to her with a sly grin.

“Well it can’t be Finn or Poe,” Rose says, playfully. “So..who is it?”

She doesn’t even bother with the pillow as she bites down on her fist to stop from screaming so loud the whole globe can hear it.

* * *

In the morning, Rose brings her breakfast in bed, nudging the towel back over the gap in the bottom of the doorway even as she navigates the room with a tray laden with food. Rey is ravenous, parched, unable to keep from devouring the full plate of eggs and sausage in a few bites. 

“Holdo took the all the males in the pack on an organized hunt so no one will bother you. I’ll drive you up to the place,” Rose says, helping her pack. “You don’t need to tell me who it is, but if you need to—I can keep a secret, you know.”

She struggles with the offer all through preparing to leave, and on the long drive up the winding, ice-slick roads of the Shasta-Trinity wilderness. Rose drives Holdo’s 4-wheel-drive monstrosity of an SUV as carefully and quickly as possible and Rey can’t stop fiddling with the temperature control, turning the dial between red and the blue air-conditioning on full blast, until she finally unrolls the windows and the moon roof and they bask in the clean smell of conifers buried in inches of sparkling white snow. 

“Thank you,” Rey says, for far more than driving her to her secluded cabin in the woods. 

“You’re welcome,” Rose replies. “You know, I didn’t think I hated nutmeg, but you absolutely reek of it.” She scrunches up her nose and they share a laugh, reminding Rey slightly of what it feels like to be normal as her body betrays her.

“He’s an _Alpha_ alpha,” Rey admits, finally, occupying herself with rummaging through her hiking backpack. 

“I guessed as much,” Rose nods. “Lone wolf?”

“You could say so,” she offers. It’s only been a day but the lingering presence is still there, wrapping around her, snakelike. She wants to be held, she wants to be consumed, and all of these feelings are at odds with the rational part of her brain telling her to fly to the other side of the country. 

“Is he nice at least?” Rose asks. 

It takes her awhile to think through her answer. “No. But he’s . . . respectful.”

“A respectful Alpha who is not a woman, color me surprised,” Rose laughs.

“Have you met many of them?” Rey wonders.

“One was more than enough,” the older girl’s face goes placid behind her round sunglasses. “I was lucky. Paige protected me until the pack could take him down. But he killed our father in the process.”

“I’m so sorry,” Rey says. Every word lamenting her situation haunts her, knowing how difficult it must have been for Rose to come of age among their kind. 

“It happens. I miss my dad, but . . . it’s the way of wolves. Fight or die, kill or be killed. Fuck or be fucked. All that nonsense. I’m glad you found Leia and we found Holdo. I can’t take any more of this patriarchal bullshit in our social order.”

“We’re both lucky,” Rey says. “I never learned what it was like to be an omega.” The word tastes like acid on her tongue. “If I didn’t have you to help me, I’d be lost at sea.”

“Holdo would have helped you, Leia too. She knows what’s up. Speaking of which, you should dig a little deeper in that bag.” Rose chuckles to herself, eyes still on the road as she flips on the radio. Holdo’s tastes in music run towards smooth jazz but the strange thing Rey pulls out of the bag is nowhere near as unassuming. She immediately drops the quivering, purple object back onto her pile of clothing.

“Oh my god, no, what. Is. That?” Rey squeaks.

“Don’t tell me you’ve never seen a dildo before?” Rose is giggling.

“I have . . . but that thing is just . . . _wrong_ ,” Rey whispers, covering her mouth, aghast. 

The car screeches to a halt as Rose stops—there’s no one on the road behind or ahead of them, but it still makes Rey grab the dashboard, looking in front and behind until she meets Rose’s locked stare. Her friend lifts up her sunglasses into her flipped black hair, peering at her intently.

“Have you never had sex with one of our kind?” Rose asks, angling her head towards Rey’s feet. Kenny G plays “Careless Whisper” in the background as Rey swallows, shaking her head.

“I haven’t even had sex with one of _those_ ,” she whispers, nodding towards the offending purple object.

“Oh, fuck.” Rose breathes, turning her attention back on the road and pressing down on the accelerator to get them back up to speed. “Strap in, girl.”

The next few hours are more than informative, coinciding with the ever-surprising sensations roiling up through her body as her hormones and sensory overload continue to ramp up in preparation for. . . something. Wolf sex, as Rose explains it, is why their kind finds a quiet place for a few hours to fuck. Rey’s never observed mating before but she’s heard it, smelt it even. And with their kind all of biology’s vagaries apply: the flirtation through shared scent, nuzzling at genitals, and then . . . knotting. 

It’s such a strange term to her, but she supposes it makes sense after further inspection of the toy (Rose assures her it’s either unused or has been sanitized, but that she should maybe do the latter herself to be sure) and gliding her fingers over the bulbous ring near the base. Rose explains how to inflate the thing with the push of a button, and they both cackle endlessly as it whirs to life and the ball grows, until Rey realizes how round it is and how she’d have never willingly stuck something like that inside of her. The animal within is much more curious, coiling in the pit of her stomach as her fever shivers build up again and she squirms on the seat.

It’s nice spending time with a friend, but her heart and mind are racing long before they hit the dirt service road that is their last leg. The GPS pings on their location, the geo-coordinates burnt into her brain as the countdown continues. She wishes she could have Rose stay, that they could work through this weird change together. Rose is neutral to her but she still smells like strawberries in summer, and the mixed, spicy odors of the men and women she’s interacted with rise up from her clothing, sending brightly-colored flashes of interest in Rey’s brain. 

The sun is at its highest when they reach the cabin—more of a shack by it’s branch-buried roof and empty windows. There’s a dock outside, weathered gray by sun and time. 

“Holdo says there shouldn’t be anyone for miles, but be safe,” Rose warns, handing her a long case with the heft and shape of the shotgun inside of it. “There’s silver buckshot in the blue shells.”

“I really hope I don’t need to use them,” Rey says, swallowing at the thought of an Alpha being so far gone that her only recourse was to shoot them. 

“Use it if you have to, and don’t hesitate. It shouldn’t kill them unless you aim point blank at their head, but it will put them out of commission for a while.”

Rey nods, grasping at the long barrel with a mixture of fear and the arousal already coursing through her. 

“Thank you, Rose.” 

“Thank me when this is over and you’re blissed out,” she jokes. “Well, hopefully blissed out and not, you know, dying from thirst.”

“I’ll drink plenty of water, I promise,” Rey says, remembering the warnings from both her friend and Holdo. 

Rose laughs hysterically as she gets in the car and drives away, the sound of the tires in the snowy grit carrying for miles. Here at the lake the world is untouched and pristine, the sun unobscured in the blue sky. The sound of slow waves lapping the shore compete with the distant croaks and _thoks_ of ravens. 

She’s alone. 

For the first time in a long time, Rey feels a sense of peace despite her body warring with her mind for control, simultaneously begging to give it up. She hoists her bags in—they’d loaded her up with supplies—and opens the door using the code Holdo had written down in her neat script along with emergency numbers. Her cell doesn’t work here without reception but there’s a landline, attached to an old rotary phone fixed in the kitchen wall with its yellowed floral wallpaper. The cabin is typical, two stories only by benefit of the upstairs loft and a tiny one-room living space below stuffed with Americana hunting and fishing couture.

She follows the instructions for turning on the generator and priming the pump, printed on coffee-stained copy paper in cheery Comic Sans font. It’s a welcome distraction from whatever is going on inside of her body. The hot flashes have subsided into a fully-stoked inferno in her belly. She holds a whole 2-gallon jug over her head as she drinks half of it down to try and quench it. Predictably, it doesn’t work. The screen door slams behind her as she strips off her clothing and changes on the wide back porch, gaining the speed of four legs as she launches herself off the long wooden expanse of the dock into the frigid waters. 

Her dense wolf body sinks down immediately, eyes blinking against the dark water rather than automatically closing. In the cold, the lake is clear, the bottom shadowed by weeds. Light shafts downward, interrupted by the bubbles from her snout. She breaks the surface, blowing water out of her nostrils, before paddling obediently back to the shore and the safety of the house. 

The shift back to human is uncomfortable. When the cold air hits her damp skin it soothes the heat radiating from her body, right before the cramps hit. For the first time since she’d changed as a teen it actually _hurts_. There’s a spike of pain in her abdomen, warm and raw, winning out over need. She holds herself wet and naked in the autumn afternoon, hands roaming over her body, hissing at the sensitivity of her nipples as she reaches lower, the sun disappearing behind high clouds. Something thick trails down her inner leg, and to her horror she finds a mixture of blood, and something more slippery.

At least she’s having her period, she thinks, cleaning off inside. There’s a plastic implant buried in her left bicep—standard issue for all omegas in any pack situation—but after hearing about heats and knotting she’s not sure if she should take a morning-after pill for the next few days, much less months.

Once she’s figured out the tiny, useless shower Rey makes a meal of a bag of jerky, putting the perishables into the newly-activated fridge. She avoids the indecent call of the thing at the bottom of her knapsack for a few minutes, finally negotiating a kettle to make herself tea. The water only gets to half-boiling, the tea bag remaining dry on the linoleum table, as she pours the hot water over the sex toy in the tiny sink. She lets the steam burn her hands as she washes the ridges and shapes, cheeks burning.

She’s wanted something inside of her for a long time, and as she slides her hands over the toy she wonders what it might be like, finally quenching that desire. Fingers work well enough, but they’ve never truly satisfied her—and now she is slowly beginning to understand why, another curse of biology. They seem to be a joke now, with the slick between her thighs and the inferno under her skin becoming more and more unbearable. 

She’d never thought to buy a toy, even when it might have saved her some of this trouble. Possibly. But there is simply no substitute for the faint traces of him on her skin from his shirt, the memory an accelerant, reminding her of what she’d walked away from—and just how hard it had been to leave.

Heats were a slow build, Rose had said; eventually her mind would be given over to it entirely. Rey wants to keep her mind as long as she can, so ever practical she puts a towel down before collapsing on the couch, spending a few minutes getting as comfortable as she can before rubbing the length of the toy against herself. 

She gasps and let’s out a whine she hadn’t expected as the pliable silicone presses against her throbbing core. The synthetic material is already warm from the kettle but grows warmer with her body, becoming slippery as she glides the shaft down between her swollen folds, shifting her hips and grinding against her clit with each movement. The fire inside of her continues to build with each slow slide, until she bites her lip and angles it to bring the end just inside of her, needing more, but, not daring to shove it in all the way. 

She cries out in frustration when she realizes it’s not right; it’s not nearly enough to make her feel right. She tries to ignore the feeling of rubber, imagining instead a heavy weight over her, his warm limbs wrapping around her own. She grazes a finger across her nipples, feeling them respond. Her eyes shutter closed, remembering how it felt as he ran his nose along her throat less than a day ago, his chest within the distance of her mouth, hair brushing against her face.

In her mind she’s kissing up his clothed chest, rubbing her face against his unshorn jaw as she takes his bottom lip between her teeth. He’s never spoken in her fantasies; he just pushes her against the door to the trailer, hands sliding underneath his too-big shirt to find her breasts and then trailing down to find how wet and sensitive she already is. It only takes his hand on her hip before he fucks her right there, her elbows against the door. They combine in body and scent as he takes her from behind, drawing her to climax with his tongue on her neck and his fingers brushing her clit with each thrust. She imagines her hips pushing up to meet his as she slides the inferior device inside of her, and it makes her moan—it’s too much, and not enough. Not with her body on fire and every inch of her skin demanding attention.

Her free hand slips from her nipples down to her clit, a poor excuse compared to the long fingers she knows should be touching her. Rough, large hands slip down from her face in memory to circle it in time with the thrust of her hips. Rey cries out in a half-howl, half-curse, hating how much she needs him here with her, her body unable to respond with a full release to anything that isn’t, really him.

Tunnel vision sets in as the day dies outside, as she quickens her pace, fighting to find any sense of completion that might sate her need even for a moment. It takes her a half-hour of immersing herself in fantasies of a dark Alpha fucking her relentlessly until her orgasm finally builds to where she can’t stop herself from bringing more of the thickness at the base inside of her, stretching her just right—still not enough. The orgasm creeps rather than rolls through her legs in syncopy with her tentative movements, working against the too-full feeling but grateful for the pressure against her inner walls. She fumbles for the button at the base, gasping at the feeling when it expands fully.

She comes back down in a silence broken by her panting, her heartbeat slowing whe comfortable with the thickness stretching her out. Eventually, it’s just a foreign object and a poor substitute. She deflates it, and with a newfound sense of clarity Rey throws the device in the trash on top of the plastic wrappers and packaging from her new camping gear. It’s not nearly enough. She’s used to having nothing, but then that had been before tasting him. 

_A week_ , Rose had said. 

The thought has her grabbing and uncorking a wine bottle, covered in Holdo’s sugary scent, and drinking from the mouth as she banks a fire in the stone fireplace. By the time the tinder has caught and the logs are glowing merrily, the bottle is almost empty.

The wine is sweet and cloying but it does nothing to wash away the juniper-berry scent coating her tongue. The notes taste so much stronger when she reaches back to her neck to swipe an experimental finger across her scent gland. After a moment she touches the tip of her finger to her tongue and then she’s tasting him again, the oils he’d left on her skin bitter with the salt of her fever.

Rey falls back on the wooden floor, hands moving lower on her body as she imagines him sweeping his tongue across her, making her clean. She rubs fingers into the ever-present coat of slick between her thighs, crying out his name only to cede to tears when it becomes clear masturbation isn’t helping. It’s not long before she climbs onto the hearth, shivering against the cold on her back as she lets the unfulfilled need in her loins continue to build unresolved, the ache becoming real pain.

Rey’s hard fingernails dig into her arms, leaving crimson half-moons. The ritual of self-harm is different for her after awakening, but still soothing. Her swift healing keeps her from scarring but it doesn’t negate the memory of the wounds beneath. The pain centers her, a relief from the different one in her belly.

She’s sure she’ll eventually roll into the embers of the fire just to end this suffering. They’ll find her in a week, no longer herself—just ash. 

* * *

_Rey._

“Fucking hell,” she says aloud, waking up from the couch in the pure dark of night and scrambling for clothing. Beside the ignored bag of her toiletries is the familiar shape of the shotgun. She loads shells with fumbling fingers, well aware that she could turn on the lights and have a better go at it. But she waits in the darkness, saltpeter and an acrid taste in her throat, listening. 

_Rey, talk to me._ He sounds urgent, pleading. 

All the want and ache inside her becomes scorched earth, bringing her limbs into motion as she paces the cabin. After a minute she ignites the crumpled paper in the fireplace with a shaking hand and waits for the tinder to catch. She’s going to kill him, and maybe that will be enough to throw off these feelings of emptiness and want. Maybe seeing his face punctured by ragged holes from silver shrapnel will make this burning go away.

There’s nothing to be heard outside except the fluttering of moths against the windowpane, trying to reach the light through the transparent barrier.

 _You came here to die,_ she says, drinking another swallow of wine. It’s less vinegar now that its aired, but still cloying. She moves against the instinct to flip on the back porch light, illuminating an empty stretch of grass rolling down to the docks and rock-bound shore. 

_Rose asked me to come_ , he says. _She says she’s sorry._

 _Liar._ Rey hoists up the shotgun, opening the door slowly and negotiating the muzzle outside first. _You forced her to tell you._

_No. Omegas can’t be compelled unless they want to._

_Is that what you tell yourself to sleep at night?_

There’s a few moments of logs crackling and snapping behind her as she searches the pale-lit grounds for the familiar black shape. The winds gusting over the lake blow in her face, refreshingly cold.

“Don’t shoot, please.”

His voice is immediately behind her. She turns, sweat-coated finger squeezing down on the trigger. The resounding explosion rocks them both, throwing him back against the doorframe leading to the mud room. He’s standing, half-naked and beginning to bleed from a burst of ragged wounds on his naked torso. She shakes off the shock of the gunblast and the painful tinnitus in her ears, aiming at his head.

“Not silver, at least,” he says in a strained, rasping voice.

“You’ve got a 50/50 chance,” Rey snarls down the double barrels. “Want to try again?”

He slumps down to the floor with a hand on his torso, smearing blood from his abdomen and presenting the yellow-tinged red of his palm to her. “I’m good.”

That coppery, sweet smell and the hair-burning stench of gunpowder can hardly subsume the warmth emanating from his body. As soon as she smells him she’s dropping the gun, slowly, and then sliding towards him. She finds herself kneeling beside him, picking small bits of shot from his oozing skin. The sing-song voice in her head purrs at her to make sure he’s alright, to comfort him after the violence.

“What the hell are you doing here?” Rey asks, letting the dull metal pellets plink at her knees. There’s nothing to be done about the damage to the house itself. What matters is the giant mass of werewolf in her house, the one looking at her like she’s a meal.

“Rose gave me the code,” he says once he’s coughed up blood and his lungs have cleared, head lolling against the wall. “Willingly. No tricks. She could smell me too, you know. She found me. She sensed we were . . . bound.”

Rey snorts, regretting her need to confess anything at all to her friend. 

“You invaded my home, you idiot. I should have shot you in the face.” Her hands are slippery with blood as she fights against knitting flesh to scrape out a small handful of shot from his right pectoral. “And where in god’s name did you get pants?”

He looks down at his legs akimbo on the floor, seeming to remember where and who he is. “I brought a bag.”

She digs her fingernails into the open wound, thumb and index finger closing on a particularly difficult piece of lead buried in the muscle. “You brought a bag?”

Her words are punctuated by his short gasps. She digs in deeper, shredding through the flesh with her nails like a serrated knife through raw meat.

“I don’t think that’s helping,” he moans. “They’ll come out on their own.”

“I don’t care,” she says, flicking the pellet away before wiping her dirty hand on the thigh of his dark jeans. It’s the wrong thing to do if she wants to stay in control—he inhales sharply, nostrils flaring as the muscles beneath flex against her hand. “Why are you here?”

“Didn’t she tell you?” he asks. He’s still fighting for air. There’s a sheen of sweat on his forehead, his black pupils dilated to the point of looking alien in the low flames. “You need me.”

“Fuck you,” Rey repeats, sitting back on her heels and grabbing the nearby bottle of wine instead of the weapon right beside her. 

“You’re body will overheat if you don’t—”

“It’s been twenty-two years, I’m still here,” she takes another drink and wipes at her mouth, the flaking crimson on her hand all the more intoxicating. “You think you know what I need. What I want.”

“At least let me look after you,” he tries another tack. “In two days you’ll be out there, trying to fuck a human. Or a cougar. I’ve seen it.”

“Have you fucked a cougar?” Rey laughs into her hand, swigging from the wine bottle to keep her thoughts from roaming to the thought of him fucking anything. Her blood is screaming, still keyed-up from finding him in her space, but also from how good he smells beneath the dagger-sharp smoke of the fire. It’s sending little shocks of anticipation down her spine, and she knows she’ll have to wash her underwear again for how the wetness is beginning to seep down her thighs.

“Haven’t gotten to that point in a rut,” he admits, mouth twisting in a slight grin.

“You sound like you’d try,” she grimaces.

“Maybe if she smelled like you,” he says. Immediately his face flushes red, right down to the heaving chest beneath her splayed hand. She doesn’t remember it coming to rest there, her fingertips moving with each rise and fall of his wide torso.

“That’s not a reassurance,” she murmurs, tracing her touch down to his abdomen. There’s a thick coat of congealing blood trailing down, interrupted by her handprints, but there’s also the curvature of his abdomen muscles, his navel. The urge to lick down the soft indentations in his belly past his waistband make her head dizzy.

“Do you have a shower?” he asks.

Rey tries to hide her involuntary grin as she imagines him fitting into the poor excuse for a shower. “I have a lake.” 

He offers her his blood-stained hand. “Help me up?”

She reaches out for him, palm swallowed in his overlarge grip. Her arm is loose as he uses the wood-paneled wall for support. The firelight colors his face, and she realizes it’s always been hard for her to latch on to the way he looks—his features seem to always be changing. He has a long nose, a short jaw. It’s his rose lips that draw her in, the ones that hide the teeth that grow, that can crack bone. _Such big teeth you have_ , _my dear_.

“You should go,” she says. Her skin is itching, the loose summer dress she’d thrown on like canvas. It’s her first change all over again. As a child, she’d scoured her body against the rough bark of a white birch until blood flowed from her torn skin. Until the fur had spilled out and she’d felt whole and safe for the first time in her life. There isn’t a tree in sight, just his too-big hands and his wood-pile smell. 

“You’re going to want to get whatever you have in the trash out for when you really need it,” Kylo says dryly, inclining his head towards the kitchen.

“Get out,” she barks the order. “You’re sleeping outside.”

“Try to aim if you see something that will actually kill you.” His dark eyes trail to the shotgun on the floor. 

He begins to transform, features lengthening and darkening as he belatedly strips off his pants with fumbling claws. Immediately he’s fallen forward on what remains of his hands to become his chosen shape. For a moment she sees his in-between form, and some awful spark flickers to life in her mind that she would very much like to run her hands over him. The shift is accompanied by the _tink, tink_ of lead shot being expelled from his body and hitting the hardwood floor. Once changed the giant, black wolf’s snout brushes against her face as he passes by, going to the door. He waits, looking up at her and letting out a low whine.

 _Don’t be afraid._ His ruddy eyes meet hers, and she can’t help but pass a hand over his head, his shoulders, fingers digging into the gray-tinged guard hairs to feel the scarred muscle beneath.There’s a small splash of white at the right side of his throat, running up to his muzzle. _Hers_ , she thinks.

He blinks at her and nods before running. The air is too still in his absence, the warmth reaching up between her thighs as she thinks of the best way to clean up a shotgun blast. She can trace his blood where its buried in the wall over the couch, and she stands haphazardly on the cushions to scrub at the laminate with bleach water. A long time passes, finding her picking the dark half-circles out from under her fingernails with a lump of soap in the sink. That’s when it hits her.

_Kylo._

_Yes?_

_I haven’t changed. How can we still speak to one another?_

_I know,_ he says. _I’ll explain. Later. Try to get some rest._

 _I want to run laps around the lake,_ she says.

 _Don’t change, it’s . . . dangerous._

A disgruntled sigh leaves her as she clears the cross-stitched pillows from the couch, curling up into herself. Rey stares at the red, glowing embers—reflecting on the eyes that had been so close once more, burning through her. Her wolf desires to run beside him, to hear their footfalls in unison muffled by the snow.

When she finally is lulled back into sleep, she dreams of doing just that.

* * *

_Every inch of her is filled with joy. Nothing is contained as she bounds out to the grass near the lapping waters and springs into the air to come down hard on the earth as if she were pouncing on a vole or other small creature._

You’re here _, she says._ Run with me.

Follow _, he answers._

_She moves out of the reach of the warm, smoke-centered light to fly down the trail he’s left for her, in the disturbed soil and his sharp-wood trace. She follows, by choice, as he skirts the edge of the lake. The trees are buried in moss and lichen and shelf-like fungi, spiderwebs gleaming with frozen dew. He’s up a ridge to a rock formation jutting from the earth, a weathered stone overhang providing shelter. Up here the treetops are not far off, opening up the sky to the undulating clouds, iridescent where the waning moon hides behind them._

_He’s a shadow splitting from the darkness of a hollow in the rock, on her in an instant, growling. But there’s no malice in the sound, it’s desperate. His muzzle is rubbing against her cheek, filling her nose with the clean musk of his scent. Her ears go back, eyes narrowing as he circles, massive head shoving against hers._

_She bows down, belly against the stone, supplicating herself with a desperate whine. His amber eye fixes on her from the side as he pushes her head down with his neck, twining against her. Then his teeth are on the ruff of her neck, that place where she knows the fur is darker, almost black and white. His tongue darts out to lap at the thick fur, snout burying in to reach the skin, canines puncturing—_

* * *

She jolts awake again. Everything is unfamiliar until she realizes she’s in the loft, the sheets beneath her soaked with perspiration. If she’d felt uncomfortable earlier she’s in agony now, twisting the linens in a talon-like grip. 

His smell is everywhere—she doesn’t want to know how he’d negotiated her body up the narrow stairs and into bed, but she’s grateful for the solitude. Rey snakes her hand down between the sheets, finding her thighs soaked, layers of fabric clinging to her. 

She touches herself experimentally, groaning when the muscles tighten inside of her at the stroke against her throbbing center. She can’t bring herself to get off; it feels completely at odds with the thing howling inside of her that wants to be touched by someone else. Someone who was so close she could almost feel him.

Fumbling for a lamp only makes this worse; she finds a glass of tepid water and the familiar but horrifying shape of the sex toy she’d thrown out. She curses mentally, only to realize that she’s signaling to the nearest person who would know why.

_You sound like you’re having difficulty._

“Where are you?” she asks. 

_Here_ , the comfortable voice comes back to her. 

“Why aren’t you here with me?” There’s a long period of silence as she curls into herself on the bed, burying her face in the place he’d sat at the edge. He’d been wearing clothing—the detergent smells clashing with the old soap on the dusty sheets—but there’s also lakewater. She can imagine his naked skin, still wet from the change back to human, water rolling down his wide chest, following the planes of his lower abdomen to his thighs.

_I won’t join you until you ask me to, when you want to._

“You’re here to try.”

_I’m here to protect you._

“I can protect myself.” Rey touches herself again, letting out a small bark of pain when it does nothing but tease. He’s so close, and yet so far away. This is insanity, she thinks: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different outcome when the obvious solution is so close at hand.

_Yes, you can. But you can also kill, and I can keep you from doing that. Or need to._

“Why can I talk to you like this?” She fights against the urge to crawl on all fours to the lower level of the house.

_You’ve been able to talk to me like this since you marked me. Bit me._

“That’s incredibly weird,” she sighs.

_I know._

“How . . . how does biting work?”

_You open your mouth—_

“You know what I mean.” Rey’s fingers twist in her hair in frustration.

_There’s a ritual._

“Fuck ritual. What does biting do?”

_A mate bites the place on the neck where the mark should be. It stays for life._

Rey remembers his body losing all power over her, his black head coming to rest against hers as she felt his pulse against her tongue.

“You mean when I tried to kill you, I married you, somehow?” The words are bitter in her mouth. 

_I would never call it that . . . but, yes. You mated me._

“I can’t believe this is happening.” Rey stumbles out of bed, knocking over the glass of water and ignoring the puddle on the floor as she makes her way down the ladder-like steps into the main room. In the light, she realizes she’s in a new nightgown—although it’s already limp and transparent with sweat and the slickness coating her thighs.

He’s curled up at the bottom of the stairs and moves quickly to the other side of the room when her feet hit the floor beside him. 

“You going to change back and talk to me?” she asks, breaking into a new carton of orange juice in the fridge and drinking straight from the spout. 

_No. It’s safer this way._ Near the fire he rests his huge head on his stretched out paws, eyeing her dolefully.

“Safer for you, or me?” Rey walks over to sit down beside him and the glowing embers in the fireplace, stilling when he flinches from her hand.

 _Both._ He doesn’t bolt when her fingers tentatively reach out to trace his forehead, her spread palm barely covering the wide swath between his ears. The wolf’s eyes close, breathing more slowly.

He’s as soft as silk right behind his ears, and he seems to enjoy her touch as he settles further, rumbling. She scratches at his skull with lazy passes of her fingernails. It’s almost comical how soothing it is to even just touch him in _lupus_ , to feel the heaving of his ribs beneath her cheek when she lays down against him. The soothing rhythm eases her own breathing, but her pulse quickens as she draws idle circles in the long hairs along his angular shoulder.

Minutes pass between them, as she learns the wolf she’d once feared, losing herself into his warmth and softness. As burning as the need in her belly is, there’s a comfort to being near something so big, so protective, The firelight lulls them both into a gentle peace. 

“This would be better if you were human,” Rey whispers, rubbing her cheek against fur. He lets out a low _whuff_ but doesn’t turn his head to look at her. She stretches across his back, trying to span the wide frame and ending up with her face against the ridge of his spine.

“You smell like Christmas,” she says, settling against him. There’s a looseness in her limbs accompanied by the electricity of sensation, something she can no longer ignore. She reaches a hand down to between her knees, teasing the edges of the fabric as her eyes flutter shut.

”Ow!” Rey hits the floor with a thud, the black shape previously underneath her now standing dutifully at the door. He’s avoiding looking at her but she can see his ears are back, and his eyes are darting around the room. 

“So you want to leave?” 

He ducks his head like a scared pup, looking at her fleetingly before pacing to and fro.

“Figure it out yourself,” Rey mutters, picking herself up off the floor and heading up to the bed with the half-empty bottle of wine. Behind her, the door opens and closes with a sharp thud. She rips the cork out with her teeth and drinks the entire thing, sputtering against the first swallow.

She collapses on the twisted sheets, continuing to explore her body in the darkness. There’s an impossible amount of moisture between her legs, her nipples so erect even just the thin cotton against them hurts. She keeps the dress on—pain is better than nothing. 

Her fingers slip between her thighs, and she moans as she buries two, then three digits inside of her. The sounds coming from her throat are obscene; there’s no way he can’t hear, but she doesn’t care. She doesn’t care about anything except the broken branch flavor buried under the wine on her tongue, fantasizing about his soft lips running up the inside of her leg. A frustrated cry rips from her throat as she realizes that her own hand isn’t doing anything except make her feel more empty. She side-eyes the glittery purple vibrator beside her. 

_You should use it._

“The only advice I’ll take is if you show me how to use it,” she growls, staring at the ceiling. “Stop reading my thoughts.”

 _You know what you’re doing. You’re also projecting._

_You can see what I’m thinking?_

_I’m currently at least a mile away. But yes. Just impressions._

Rey considers throwing the offending object past the railing of the loft. Instead, she slides it into herself without preparation, her other hand rubbing furiously at her sensitive center. She’s a teen again, free of the other wolves who would have scented the desperation on her she’d worked so hard to contain, her back pressed against dead leaves and the sunlight filtered through trees as she realizes the pleasure the taste of blood on her tongue can bring. 

_I’m going to send you more impressions, until you come back,_ she thinks. He doesn’t answer. 

The second orgasm is just as dissatisfying as the first, although it’s now colored by his scent in the sheets and the comfort of remembering his animal shape beneath her cheek. She takes the thickness at the bottom of the toy and inflates the knot, gritting her teeth at the feeling of being stretched out, filled. It’s not the warm, pliable flesh she wants, but she finds her climax imagining him at the foot of the bed, watching her for a long time before those hands finally wrap around her own to ease the toy out of her grip, kissing her to make up for his absence.

She throws it against the wall afterward, letting out a scream of rage at the empty house. The red behind her eyelids as she pulls her dress off, ripping the seams. Rey barrels out of the cabin to the white-lined shore of the calm lake and wades into the freezing waters.

There’s a slimy muck beneath her feet as she kicks out into the dark waters. She doesn’t stop swimming until the cabin is child-sized on the horizon. Delicate snowflakes, illuminated blue by the dock light, disappear into the waves as she floats. The lake is an embrace, cold and gigantic, and it leeches the heat from her body. For the first time in hours, she begins to shiver. 

When she swims back, there’s a dark form on the dock. He’s just as naturally still as his wolf, the white dots of snow drifting down into his hair and his breath rising up like steam. Kylo is fully human again, dressed in a dark sweater and jeans. She doesn’t have to ask why he’s waiting, he just helps her out and wraps a thick, soft towel around her as water pools on the splintery wood beneath her toes.

“Feeling better?” he asks. 

“No.” She shudders as he rubs the towel around her shoulders, lifting it up to dry her hair and exposing her thighs to the cool night air. 

“I restarted the fire—”

“Stay with me,” she says. The words come out less breathy and desperate than she feared. It’s an order. He freezes, shadowed face searching hers. As unreadable as his expression is, there’s a spike of fear in his bodily response. 

She takes his hand in hers, marveling at how smooth his palm is and how his fingers seem capable of encircling her entire neck. She traces the grooves in his palm, finding a tremor that stills as he relaxes. Kylo’s eyes narrow, his mouth crooking at the corner as they both silently acknowledge the energy passing between them. When she pulls him along behind her, he doesn’t move. Rey looks at him curiously before smiling.

“Come.” It’s the voice that is her own and yet isn’t—the one that feels like the breeze rustling through the treetops. It sounds like running headfirst through a grassy field without a second thought to intention over impulse. 

He follows.


	4. I Want To Be Adored

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _I don’t have to sell my soul_   
>  _He’s already in me_   
>  _I don’t need to sell my soul_   
>  _He’s already in me_   
>    
>  [The Stone Roses (cover by King Woman) “I Wanna Be Adored” ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v6Wm9o9f3_M)
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> The tags have been updated to address my beta reader's challenge: needs more kink. This was also the reason for a delay in posting, my apologies. Please enjoy and let me know if you have any more specific thirsts for Rey's heat week besides the expected addition of werewolf.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

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> _It was right that we did meet each other in each other’s eyes_  
>  _It was right that we did see each other in our shadow sides_  
>  _It was wrong then too that crazy love, loves crazy as it does_  
>  _And each of us and both of us so crazy, as it was_  
>     
>  _You were right on time to break your head and make the death bed_  
>  _You were right on time to crash those galaxies and flat-line_  
>  _You were right on time to make the light inside of me a life_  
>  _You were right on time to meet me, crazy love, and watch us die_  
>     
>  _Who else is going to love someone like you, that’s marked for death?_  
>  _Who else is going to be with you when you breathe your last?_  
>  _Who else is going to take my place and hold and keep you safe?_  
>  _Who else would ever stay?_  
>     
> \- [Emma Ruth Rundle “Marked For Death”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H8xSaqLVzUA)
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> All my thanks and love to my beta [caisha](https://archiveofourown.org/users/caisha/pseuds/caisha) aka [reylosource](http://reylosource.tumblr.com/) on tumblr for being one of my oldest and favorite mutuals, for introducing me to the many nuances of A/b/o, and to holding my hand through posting what will eventually be monsterfucking kink.
> 
> [There's a dark atmospheric metal playlist for this](https://open.spotify.com/user/126963742/playlist/5j1JI5OOMza7n165j8B6lK?si=jqQk-zFVQ5qRGp9Lz9V3Sw) if you like that sort of thing and want to hear the inspo for each chapter.

The little omega smells honey-sweet, as if spun sugar had been woven into her gold-tinged fur. He watches from his vantage on a rise between trees, sneaking up as she noses through the dappled light across bark and brush trying to find him. He lets out a low growl, laughing internally when she bristles like a cat and spins backward to lock eyes with him. 

_Did they send you to spy on me, small one?_

He sees the defiance in her snout held high, her liquid copper eyes. Once upon a time she might have intrigued him—but not after the mark. Now she’s just stinking of another male’s scent along with one much more known to him. He should have given her death for seeking him out, but that heady, familiar aftertaste holds him back.

The omega bows her head after a moment, rolling on the ground to expose her neck and belly. Her movements are automatic and uncaring, a gesture of peace resigned in the knowledge that she has power here he doesn’t. Of course she has power; he can smell _her_ on the air, and it quickens his heartbeat to a rabbit-sprint pace.

 _No one sent me_ , she responds with narrowed eyes, still lower. _I came here for Rey._

 _Where is she?_ Kylo feels his ears flick forwards, his muzzle dipping to take in the spicy perfume of her presence. It’s a few hours old but changed, somehow—mingled with sweat and hormones so thick he has to swallow to keep from slavering. He pads down to the golden wolf, noting her rigidity as he approaches. 

_Gone._ _You scared her,_ she lies. When he makes no move to come closer than a few dozen yards she relaxes, getting up to shake stray leaves from her coat.

_That’s not why you’re here, is it?_

_I just wanted to see who she’d bitten,_ she coaxes.

He stares at her impassively but the wolf preens, much like he had the night before when Rey had seen him for the first time. It hadn’t been his first, not even the second or third since he’d healed. But it was an awakening to watch those cold hazel eyes soften, something like approval touching her perfect features. It had rendered a year of avoiding her meaningless. 

_You must be Rose,_ he plays his only trump card, grasping for control.

The omega’s fear revs, her sweetness becoming sour as she backs up, paws dragging in the dirt. He follows, approaching her with the kind of menace he usually reserves for much bigger threats. She stops her backwards retreat when he finally sits down, laughing at her internally. 

_You’ll forgive me for knowing who my so-called mate spends time with._

_Well I don’t know you. But I do know you’re an idiot._ The little wolf actually rolls her black-lined eyes at him, mouth agape to expose a curled, pink tongue. _Your ‘so-called mate’ went into heat._

It’s his turn to be afraid. His skull is filled with angry bees at the word. A whine rises up from his chest before he regains control enough to silence himself.

 _Does she know why?_ He can practically smell his own desperation.

 _No_ , Rose tosses her head in a human gesture. _I don’t think she knows about marks._

 _Don’t tell her._ Kylo’s ears are pinned to his skull, just rational enough to be ashamed that he’d felt the compulsion to use the voice. _Please._

She blinks at him, black nose swooping down. 

_Funny._ Her wry, soft voice has no humor in it as she continues, _I thought Alphas didn’t ask permission._

He snarls half-heartedly, now pacing a visible path in the forest floor. Rose stares at him, patient but obviously enjoying her advantage. 

_The mark was an accident,_ he confesses after a moment’s pause, lifting his face to the afternoon sun peeking through the amassing clouds. _I didn’t want to obligate her to me. I didn’t think she wanted it._

Rose’s mental chuckle is bell-like, ringing through his head. 

_Rey was right, you are respectful. Also incredibly dumb. Omega heats don’t happen by accident._

He swivels to meet her curious gaze. 

_She doesn’t know that she’s going to come after you_ , Rose says.

 _What do you want me to do?_ Kylo finds himself pulled closer, urged on by the understanding of what that spice and musk she’s saturated in means, not just for him but for every wolf who finds her path.

 _I don’t want her running fifty miles across Ninka territory and into whatever hellhole you’ve got past that ridge,_ she answers. _I need you to do something for me. Well, for her._

Once Rose has told him what she wants, he’s the one to bow at her feet and expose his neck in both gratitude and humility. 

* * *

Inside, Kylo breaks free of the tight grasp she has on his hand. Rey doesn’t say anything as he moves through the kitchen, or when he opens the refrigerator. There’s a comfortable peace as she watches the man she should have killed make her a meal, slicing evenly through a ripe tomato and swiping mayo over bread in the most mundane way. He pours her a glass of water and another of wine from a newly-opened bottle, so silly next to a plate with a sandwich on it.

“I could hear your stomach rumbling from a hundred yards away. You should eat.” He doesn’t make anything for himself, although she can sense his hunger.

“You’re a good cook.” She says this between bites of tender roast beef and sips of wine, toes wiggling against the concrete hearth of the stone fireplace as the towel slips around her shoulders. He’s taken his place on the couch, as always making normal-sized furniture look like it was made for a child.

He snorts, slightly. “That’s not cooking. I can make you something else if you want.”

“I’m not picky,” Rey answers, fingering a piece of lettuce out from her teeth. “I’ve eaten roadkill.”

“You _did_ have a hard knock life, didn’t you?” If he’s horrified, it’s buried under the laughter in his eyes.

“Something like that,” she sets the plate beside her. “You’ve never eaten a day-old possum?” _Of course he hadn’t_ , she thinks, clenching her jaw. He had everything in the world, and he’d traded it to be a monster. 

“Does dry-aged steak count?” Kylo jokes, crossing his arms across his chest. 

“I don’t know what that is.” 

He bites his tongue but she can hear it anyway. _We can fix that._

“Now who’s the one projecting?” Rey asks. 

She drinks her wine as he fidgets his way further into the couch cushions. There’s immediate discomfort there, and she revels in it. The warmth from the fire is chasing the chill away, reminding her why they’re both here.

“Did you like the show?” she drawls. 

The illusion of a tall, sinister man before her breaks when he blushes crimson red, starting at his neck and tracing its way up to his cheeks and ears. She’s still laughing to herself when her mind is flooded with the image of him in the woods, breathing in ragged gasps as he’s hunched over and running his hand back and forth over something with weight and heat—

Rey blinks, face burning brighter than the blaze next to her. Kylo looks at her again, rubbing the day’s worth of stubble on his jaw. 

“Sorry about that.”

“I want to see more,” she says, quietly.

“No,” he answers immediately.

“You’re not sorry for enjoying it, though.” She stands up to move into his space, pushing his chest back with a hand. He folds back against the couch, eyes so wide the whites show around the brown of his irises. There’s a furnace beneath his shirt, and she draws her fingertips over it as she straddles his lap. 

“I did that to you?” Rey can’t help but smile at the memory, and the reality as stiff as stone beneath her. 

“You do a lot of things to me,” he breathes, looking up at her through long, dark lashes. “I don’t even know your real last name.”

“I don’t have one,” she says, settling her thighs around his. She resists the urge to grind the bare skin beneath her towel against him, choosing instead to sniff at his held breath. After a moment she rubs her cheek against his in the innate gesture of ownership.

“Are you sure this is a good idea?” he asks into her ear, making a sound deep in his chest when she buries her hands in his hair and tilts his chin up, fingernails grazing his scalp. She angles her head to best explore his mouth with an experimental brush of her lips, feeling him petrify with the contact.

“I’m not sure, yet,” Rey says. She rubs her nose against his, tasting his held breath. “If it’s the only idea you’ve had for days, is it worth asking?”

“I don’t want you to feel . . .” he says. “You’re not exactly clear-headed.”

“Don’t patronize me.” She’s drowning in the clear, sharp smell of him filling her lungs, in her mouth. “I’ll kill you after this is over, if I need to.”

“Could you?” 

She barely hears his question, kissing him again. Underneath the better parts of a timber mill is the taste of a mountain stream running over granite. It’s woven into the taste of his blood, in memory. She takes his bottom lip between her teeth, piercing the flesh to relish the small drop she sucks from it before the cut closes. When she finally pulls back he’s looking at her differently, plaintive and desiring.

“I’d prefer if we talked first.” Kylo sounds as if he’s choking with each word, fingers wrapping around her shoulders without the will to shove her off.

“About what? Me killing you?” The roiling arousal in her belly is making her muscles contract in strange new ways, sending rationality out the window. She focuses on the twinges of panic on his face, and the way his hands flex against her skin like he can’t decide whether to push her away or pull her in to close the gap between their mouths again. Every fiber in her body wills him to kiss her of his own volition.

“I need to know you’re in control,” he manages, staring at her lips. ‘I need to know you want me, not that you just need me.”

“I didn’t know there was a difference,” Rey huffs. “How exactly do I make that clear?”

“Take control.” He says it in a low voice; it’s not an order as much as a plea. Her hands trace down his neck to mirror his own hold on her shoulders and she eases him back to leave his lap, stepping away from the couch. With an easy gesture she removes her towel, letting it slip to the floor and kicking it away with a bent foot.

“Why? Are you afraid of yourself?’ Rey’s words are a whisper. She watches his hands clench at his sides, the faint view of his tongue swiping across his swollen lips. His scent is in her lungs; he breathes like a racehorse held behind the gates.

“You’re afraid of what you want, aren’t you?” she asks, running her nails down her chest to dimple the soft flesh of her breasts. God she wished it was his fingers, the ones currently crooked like claws. “Would you be able to just watch?”

Rey’s hands venture lower, thumbs over her belly button, index fingers threading between the short curls at the apex of her thighs. He answers all of her questions by leaning forward, his hair falling across his forehead with the sudden movement, eyes wild— 

—and stopped cold by a flick of her chin to the side.

“No.” The order is just as delicious as he is, frozen in the need to touch her. “No, I don’t think you could.”

“Stay where you are,” she warns him over her shoulder, stalking to the entryway and the supply closet she’d found earlier. She stumbles on something laying in the darkness, cursing, trying not to think of him hiding a grin for her in the other room, when the smell hits her. Its sharp and stinging, and she can’t help but unzip the heavy bag that reeks of his soap and his scent and that offending odor.

She traverses a dozen dark paths leading back to _control_ , finding her way. She knows what she has to do.

* * *

It was supposed to be magic, he told himself. It was supposed to be perfect. But this was beyond either.

He’d never fucked a human before, much less a cross-human. For good reason. There was no explaining his body—no making it easy for another to see him with this deformity. To both worlds he was just some weird genetic mistake and he’d chosen instead to go head-first into the forest to find something that made him feel less strange, sometimes killing to relieve the hunger.

And yet he’d found her, over and over again. Rey had stood over him, snarling while he’d been dying with his father’s blood in his throat and a silver bullet in his liver. He _had_ died, after all, when she’d ripped his gland out with her teeth and taken away a future he’d never even really considered on the front lines of this stupid war. Every patrol meant being sent deeper into lands that weren’t their own, and Snoke didn’t care whether he lived or died, just that he did his job as the front line of defense.

Wolves died easily, humans died easily, but Alphas always seemed to run at death headfirst. Violence was their first language. No matter how much civility you injected into their man-shaped experiences, the instinct was there to destroy everything until they could be put down by something more powerful.

Was that how he’d ended up here, in a cabin in the godforsaken middle of nowhere with, the angel of his own destruction standing before him holding a length of thick steel chain? Rey holds something worse in her other grip, bound in a thick, black leather hilt.

“Do you trust me?” 

His eyes are locked on his most prized possession, too large in her small hand. She’s also taken one of his shirts by the look of it, unless she has a preference for men’s shirts three sizes too large. It hangs just halfway down her thighs, making his mouth dry as cotton.

“That’s mine.” He nods towards her, heart skipping a beat at the smile that flashes across her face. _You're mine_ , the wolf corrects him.

“You brought it here.” She drops the bundle, pulling fat links of chain apart with her fingers. The metal bends like clay. Instinctually, he turns his back on her, hands offered behind him for her to tie them in place. 

Damp strands of Rey’s hair fall against his cheek as she wraps his wrists together, closing the links in tight knots. Surely she knows he could break free if he willed it; she has the same strength. But he relaxes into her ministrations, pleased that she’d do what he’d asked. When she’s finished he leans back against the couch to find a comfortable position despite the awkward tangle of metal pressed against his spine.

“Tell me why you have something like this?” she asks, standing up with the dagger held away from her. Freed from the casing the almost-foot-long silver blade gleams butter yellow in the firelight. 

“It’s used for executions,” he admits. His nose stings from the metal, eyes watering. 

“And you gave me a table knife?” The lilt in Rey’s voice matches the pleased turn of her dusky rose mouth. Her wrist flicks the knife point to his face, the uncut garnets set in the cross hilt flashing a dull red.

He shrugs, sniffing. “I knew you couldn’t do it.”

The reaction he’d hoped for is lost in the confusion in her eyes, destroying his resolve to goad her again. 

“Then why did you ask me to kill you?” Her hand shakes as she brings the tip of the silver blade to his unmarked cheek, hovering just beneath his eye. 

“I needed to know you couldn’t.” Kylo looks up, willing her to hear him. He’s aware his eyebrows are twitching along with his face, without his volition, as tears threaten to stream down his cheek. “I wanted to prove it to you.”

Rey moves by slow degrees, touching him with the metal softly, forcing him to hold still lest it break the skin. His facial muscles are pulling back in a rictus grin, so he pushes his lips together instead.

“What aren’t you telling me?” The knifepoint creeps down to his jaw, leaving a burning pain in its wake. 

He tries, god help him. He wants so badly to know that she understands what his mother’s words had branded to his soul so many years ago, when she’d first told him about the mark and the obligation it held: _the one who marks is bound. For life, and for death._

He uses all his training to keep the thought to himself, instead saying: “I trust you.”

“Good.” She regards him without mercy, now, her eyes slits. “We’re not done yet.”

The blade is gone, and so is she. There’s a roaring in his ears, drowning out the sounds of slamming cabinets and the running of the tap in the kitchen. He can hear her drink her wine, can smell the anger radiating off of her along with that always-present musk of the heat. Then there’s the steady cascade of small round things dropped into a glass container.

At least he’s never lied to her, he thinks to himself, wiping his hot face against his shoulder and leaving sad trails in the black fabric from his tears and his running nose. He closes his eyes, calling up the sight of her fire-limned body touching herself before this game, the way she’d moved like clothing was a prison to be freed from. Just the sight of her glistening with sweat, the same moisture on her legs now cold on his jeans, sends him into a spiral of self-loathing and lust.

Kylo’s legs are spread wide, and he thinks about the silver to soothe the erection pressing painfully against his left leg. It just brings him back to the night before, her face flushed as he’d brought her hands up to angle a knife between his ribs. Predictably, this imagery doesn’t work to calm him down.

“You’re projecting again,” she says, close to him now. 

“Can you blame me?” 

He inhales sharply at the sight of Rey’s slender fingers gently swirling his dagger in a jam jar filled with water and tiny metallic spheres. Her wrist turns in the other direction, metal shivering against glass with each counter-clockwise circle.

_Clink, clink, clink._

He’s confused until she pulls the ceremonial blade from the jar to hold it upright, watching the water shiver down the edge towards the black cross handle. It hangs for a moment on the leather-wrapped hilt before splashing against her wrist. The barest curl of steam rises from her arm, along with the smell of burning hair, but she doesn’t flinch.

“What are you doing?” he manages, wincing.

“Proving to myself what I _can_ do to you,” Rey murmurs.

She steps forward, knighting his shoulder with a drag of the dagger against his shirt. The silver infusion seeps through, sending a streak of red across his vision. He jerks back, clenching his jaw. A hiss of pain escapes between his teeth. 

Even in agony, he keeps his eyes on Rey’s features as they change from calm to concern to horror—the citrusy smell of her panic mixing with the silver. 

“No, no,” she drops the knife, remembers to set down the glass. Then her hands are ripping his shirt open to ease the stinging on his shoulder, buttons popping off to skitter across the floor. The air needles at his inflamed skin, and he barks with pain when she rubs the towel to wipe off the toxic water.

“I’m sorry, so sorry,” she keens, ripping his sleeve down to the elbow. The warm wet of her mouth follows, her tongue sweeping over the skin. He trembles deeply at the tenderness, at how he aches more for it than her hand fisted against his bare chest or the tease of her legs wrapped around his.

“You can hurt me if you want to.” He doesn’t resist rubbing against her hair, calmed by the clove-and-oranges smell of it. “I’ve been tortured before.”

There’s a strange brightness in her blown pupils when she pulls away—not just the shine of an animal’s eyes in the dark. Wetness forms on her lower lashes. It reminds him of the ocean air mixing with her wolf’s scent the first time he’d followed it.

“I don’t want to torture you.” She looks to the side, blinking back tears. “I want to kill the person who would do that to you.”

“I know.” He rests his mouth against her clavicle, grounding himself to the present moment. “It’s the mark.”

“No,” she says, “it’s me.”

Her hands rise up to caress his scalp behind his ears. His heart is stuttering in his chest, his groin aching with each pass of her hand through his hair. He knows what he has to do, then, even though it’s difficult. 

“ _Hurt me, Rey_.” 

Her spine straightens at the order, brow furrowed as she meets his eyes again. The trust remains between them, but something else is making her pause. He understands the sensation running through her, the same one that he’d found time and time again. It’s the need to turn that domination of will into a strength, to be known and compelled and still feel in control. 

“I don’t know if I can,” she says.

“Please.” He lets his need color the word, not ashamed to beg for the pain if it leads to the comfort.

She’s automatic in her movements as she runs the dagger across the rim, leaving just a glistening trail of water on the fine edge.

“Will you tell me if it’s too much?” Rey asks, hesitating. Her elbow is crooked so that the blade is parallel over his bent chest.

“This is nothing.” Kylo scoffs. But then he’s immediately flexing back into the couch when the first drop rolls down onto his right pectoral. His belly is curving inwards, away from the second. The third lands on his nipple, making him grunt in pain. Rey doesn’t stop, watching carefully with lips parted as he recovers, as he’s forced to anticipate each motion of her wrist, each drip. 

Almost dying from silver should have made him immune to his effects but of course it would always be painful, horrible, like acid seeping through the fatty layers of tissue to char the sinews beneath. He can see the red welts now, and somehow that makes it worse. All his protests die inside him, as he lives for the scent coming off of her, the way tears roll down her face as she tries not to break from the command.

A splatter, and then the burn. It reaches down deep, radiating to his core. He’s gasping like a fish, straining against his bonds when Rey snaps. 

She reclaims her place between his legs, using his thighs as leverage. She murmurs soft adulations, following the trail of burns across his chest with her mouth. He makes an embarrassing noise when she finds his nipple and the pain recedes beneath the gentle strokes of her tongue. He hasn’t stopped being harder than he’s ever been in living memory but his cock jumps with each lick, each graze of her teeth. 

“You smell different when you’re in pain,” she says against his skin as she goes lower, finding where the water had rolled a path down the line of hair over his navel. “When I was silver-poisoned, it was all I could think about.”

It takes everything he has to keep from breaking the chains to bury his hands in her hair, to free the nagging, throbbing length of his cock from his jeans. 

“It took me months,” he gasps, “to stop thinking of you looking at me. Like no one had before.”

“Hmm?” Rey is partly-obscured by his chest but her eyebrows are raised, gaze holding him. 

“Like you’re looking at me now.” Kylo shifts beneath her. He wishes he could reach down and pull her up, and tell her what it meant to be _hers_. That he could tell her she still has a choice.

It’s clear in her green-touched eyes that she doesn’t have one.

* * *

_Protect. Comfort. Heal._

Rey is going insane, or dreaming. She’s sleepwalking and any moment she’ll wake up from delving into the darkest fantasy, one she’d never known existed inside of her. But he’s real, sweat beading on his forehead as his breathing slows and the red inflammation on his chest fades.

It had physically hurt her to see him suffer, to hear the little noises he’d made and watch his eyes close tight with each wound. Her heart had clenched and stayed that way, waves of empathy rocking through her while desire pooled in her belly. The silver is bitter and burning on her tongue and yet she would lick him clean for an eternity to quiet the instinct screaming at her to hold him tight, to rock his body against hers as if he were a crying child. She’d never even thought of children that way.

Kylo clears his throat, adjusting beneath her to break the spell. Her hands are on his legs and her eyes dart to the bulge straining his jeans just past her fingertips.

“I didn’t know that would be . . .exciting for you,” she deflects, standing up. “Should I let you go?”

“No.” He leans forward, rolling his face against her breasts as her nails sink into the skin beneath his tattered shirt. He doesn’t stop leaning into her, forcing her to shuffle back.

She nudges the glass of silver as far away as she can with the inside of her bare foot, brain short-circuiting as he positions himself to kneel before her, arms trapped behind him against the couch edge.

“What else do you want?” Rey hadn’t needed to ask, because he’s already ducked his head to her thighs, nosing beneath the hem of his shirt. She says an inaudible ‘fuck’ as his head disappears partially beneath the faded black material, his unseen mouth traveling up the inside of her leg. His lips are warm, tongue hot as it teases at her bare skin. 

Distantly, awkwardly, she feels shy and pushes his shoulders back with white-knuckled fingers. There’s the knowledge that she was bleeding earlier, and the maddening ever-present gush trickling down her thighs that’s only gotten worse with each touch.

“I think . . . I think I’m on my period,” she cringes.

“I think I would know by now if you actually were,” he reappears, half-hooded by the shirt, mouth crooked in a smile. “You tried changing, right? It’s called estrus.”

“That sounds disgusting.”

“Natural,” he punctuates by dipping his head forward to lap at her again. She jumps like a cat, holding onto him for dear life as each stroke draws out a quake in her body, the ache inside her a fist squeezing tight. She pulls off the shirt in a fluid motion, drawn into further desire by the sight of his tousled hair and his nose nudging the dark curls between her thighs.

“Oh god,” she steadies herself on the couch, wrapping her leg over his shoulder to stabilize. 

The cool coat of slick on her lips is replaced by heat from the flat of his tongue, cleaning her as she had cleaned him. This is different than anything she’d ever felt before. Some part of her wishes his tongue was longer, rougher as he brings it between her folds, the tip circling where they end. 

“Spread yourself,” he says against her, and she obeys, opening herself so he can better travel up and down her core, his body bent backwards against the gentle rock of her hips. Rey can barely stand on her own. Her hand in his hair holds her steady as much as keeping him from over-stimulating her, as his tongue separates her lower lips, impossibly soft. He responds so well to her guidance, tending to her and the new sounds coming from his chest drive her deeper into pleasure. 

“Will you come for me like this?” Kylo asks after what feels like a lifetime, his deep brown eyes finding hers from below. The sight of his face, wet from her, makes her inner walls constrict in agony. She bites her tongue against the urge to beg for his fingers, his cock—anything—to fill that void.

“I don’t know if I can without something inside—” Her concentration is broken by his tongue swirling against her clit, lips applying light suction.

Now she’s begging. “Please, please, fuck me.”

 _Come for me._ She doesn’t expect him to speak to her in her mind, and it doesn’t matter if its an order or not because she’s peaked as quickly as she’s heard it, bending over him with her arm stretched out to hold onto the back of the couch through the tremor. 

He doesn’t stop sucking until her body has stilled, and then it’s just to kiss at the new dampness slipping down her leg, humming his approval.

“You could do that the whole time, you bastard.” She collapses onto his bent knees, brushing against his mouth as it travel upwards to nip at her breasts. Once seated in his lap she twines her arms around his sturdy frame. 

“It’s cheating.” He admits once they’re at eye level, his gaze magnetic in the desire contained there.

“Show me not cheating, then.”

Rey brushes her lips against his, the contact sparking bright, silver light behind her closed eyes. He doesn’t resist, letting her kiss him deeply. She licks at his tongue between his teeth, tasting herself on him: salt mingling with his wood-in-water scent. She breathes a heavy sigh of relief that it's free of blood. 

His soft-as-a-down-pillow lips find each curve of her jaw and cheekbone but it feels chaste, even when she lowers her body to his, enjoying the sandpaper texture of his jeans against her sensitive core. She finds his length and rubs herself against it, wetness seeping into the denim.

It's only when she goes to unbuckle his belt that the chains clatter to the floor, broken with nary a sign of strain. Her hands are wrested away just as quickly, brought over her head as he pushes her down to the worn rug and the hard floor beneath. 

“I didn’t give you permission to do that,” Rey chides.

“You wanted me to show you how to come naturally,” he says. She can’t argue, not with her mouth occupied by his tongue.

Rey fists her hands into his shoulders as his face travels down her neck to her chest, breath warming her nipple before taking almost the entire breast into his mouth, and pulling. He spends a long time drawing gasps and cries from her, laving the pebbled skin with his tongue. His dark hair tickles her as he switches back and forth between her breasts, biting softly at their curving, yielding shape.

“You’re the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen,” he says when he finally comes back up to her mouth. His arousal smells like juniper, heady and clean.

“You don’t know me, yet.” She returns his kiss, writhing against his leg, wishing he’d touch her with his fingers as he had with his mouth.

“I want to know you,” he murmurs, brushing the damp hair back from her face. “Is that alright?”

“Only if you give me the same.” Rey pauses. 

“Everything I have is yours,” he says, disentangling from the ruined fabric to reveal the full measure of his scars and huge chest. _Her scars_ , she thinks, mouth following the raised, white claw marks on his throat while her hands return to unbuckling his belt.

“Not yet.” His arms encircle her, the freedom from the scratchy carpet a relief before he’s carrying her up the stairs, stumbling slightly when she captures his lips again halfway up. 

He sets her legs down first on the bed, not separating but holding her up to kiss her deeply. It’s gentle, too gentle, and she surrenders to the need to see him, to feel him. Rey fights to unbutton his jeans, her fingers slipping beneath his boxers and finding his shaft. Carefully she draws her touch down to the base, Kylo stilling beneath her. When she finds it she pulls back as if scalded—not because she doesn’t expect the shape, but because he’s still, very, very proportional. 

“First time?” His lopsided grin tells her he knows the answer, and she sends out a silent curse at Rose.

“First everything,” Rey seethes. “Don’t tell me you can’t handle that.”

His eyes are dazed as he kisses her again, shucking off his pants. “If you don’t like it you can kill me afterwards, like you said.”

She’s fascinated by his exposed body—by the hard planes of his chest and the hair that layers the outer edges of his legs. In the ambient light of the loft he looks like a statue carved of marble, the kind that only someone sure of their talent could render. His face morphs at every angle, any insecurity in his expression chased away as her hand travels down his cock again, tightening around the bulge right above his pelvis.

“You’ll have to show me how this works,” she says as she explores him with her fingertips, earning a moan. He’s soft like silk over the hardness, the ridges of veins and skin a map she wants to know as well as the territory she’s familiar with. The bulbous shape circling the base of his shaft is just a little wider, swollen slightly.

“It gets bigger . . . once I’ve come,” he says through clenched teeth.

“How big?” Rey is sure that it won’t fit inside her, even now. 

“Your body should be able to . . . Oh fuck.” He’s abruptly cut off as she dips down, her tongue licking broad swaths across his length and gently sucking at the salty fluid already weeping from the head. His cock twitches and he lets out a series of moans as she continues to taste him, reveling in the musky smell of his body and the coarse hair she brushes with her parted lips. 

It takes him awhile to come to his senses when she replaces her mouth with her hands, rising up until their faces meet again in the dark. 

“Sounds like I should come first, then.” Rey angles her head to avoid bumping noses, kissing each mole on his cheek. His eyelashes ghost against her skin as he submits to her attention and the gentle tug of her fingers.

“You’ve really never done anything?” he asks. 

“No,” she looks into his bottomless eyes. They rove again across her face like she isn’t real. He’s got violet circles above his cheekbones where sleep has eluded him, but he looks awake, ready to flee.

“I should be able to figure it out, right?” Rey twists her loose grip, fascinated by the velvety feel of him and his strained expression.

“You already have,” Kylo says.

“Show me.” She pushes him back on the bed, climbing on top of him. She considers just settling down onto his thick cock until he pulls her legs forward, bringing his mouth in line with the juncture of her thighs.

“No cheating this time,” he says against her damp skin. She holds herself up, anticipation making her body quake.

Fantastically large fingers grip her ass, but he doesn’t guide her—he lets her guide him with her body and her hands in his hair, body pressed into his mouth. His tongue is soft but she can imagine it rougher, longer, and she almost finds herself pleading with him to change just so she can feel it that way.

Just when she’s going to scream that it’s not enough, it will never be enough, he presses a finger inside her, then another. She moans and grinds down on his hand, letting him curl forward to keep her caught between external and internal sensations. There’s some negotiation as she finds he can better press most of his hand inside of her while she’s on her back and he’s kneeling between her legs.

After feeling his will run through her, after knowing what the wolf can do, she can’t bring herself back to the precipice. Rey finds herself staring at the ceiling, laughing at the surrealness even as she’s gasping and drenching the bed beneath them both with his saliva and her fluids. 

When he realizes she’s not responding fully he moves up beside her, pressing his body to hers.

“You alright?” he asks, thumb tracing her eyebrow.

“It’s not . . .” she giggles again, biting her tongue at what she knows is an odd reaction.

“I know,” he follows his touch with his mouth, kissing her forehead. “Tell me what you’d like. We can go slow.”

“ _Crinos_.”

His face goes through the stages of surprise that one would usually associate with finding a spider crawling up their arm, but he stops at jerking away physically. 

“Too much?” she sighs, still smiling. “Even after I tied you up?”

It takes him a while to get the words out, mouth working in a sensual fashion despite the mild displeasure he’s keeping at bay. 

“Maybe not for the first time,” he says. 

“I’ll take that as a possibility,” she says, holding onto his neck and pulling herself against him. She can’t tell if he’s still traumatized by her request, and a part of her doesn’t care. He adjusts so she can climb on top of his legs again, finding the right perch to rub the slipperiness of her body against his cock. 

Kylo wraps his forearms around her back to leverage her to where she’s poised above the head, the heat of his velvety skin against hers. She buries her face in the black hair sticking to his neck, drenching herself in his cologne-like scent.

 _I want you,_ she thinks.

He grasps her hips. _Then take me._

Together they ease her down onto his shaft, her weight supported by his trembling hands. There’s a tightness that is nothing like the toy, or her fingers, but somehow less intense than she’d imagined. It’s a fullness that rises above her belly into her ribs and subsumes the hollowness that’s been there her entire life. Rey cries out with the sweat from his throat on her open lips, the traces of his fear tasting like brass. 

He’s painstakingly slow in letting her settle onto him, not forcing her in any way. She finds it easier to get him to return her movements by taking the skin of his neck into her mouth and tugging with her teeth, filling her airways with his taste again. 

Impressions flood her thoughts: his thoughts, his feelings—wrapped tightly in gingerbread and sun-warmed honeysuckle. She’d never scented herself before, but in his arms she’s revealed as light and perfect and _something more_. The breath remains in her chest as she catches flashes of seeing herself through a dirty garage window marred by his reflection, sitting next to the fresh-picked bones of her motorcycle while Rose spreads a series of new gears out between them. There’s the urge to stay away, and the haunting sense that he’s leaving something behind. He’d stalked her, but he’d left her alone after that.

“Kylo,” she breathes. “You should have come to me.” It’s not just the heat speaking for her. He’s satisfied a chemical itch but also uncovered the emptiness inside of her she hadn’t even known was there, that had been there since they’d last looked at each other across blood and snow. 

“I know.” His voice is a midnight without a moon, or stars. “I feel it, too.”

Rey rewards him in moving for them both, knees bending with her nails digging into his shoulder, brushing her breasts against his smooth chest. They’re connected at all points and she feels when he forgets to breathe, each inch of movement up and down bringing her closer to his knot. 

Kylo stops her from impaling herself too deeply with each stroke; the wetness making it difficult for him, easy for her to keep reaching. 

“Fuck me, Alpha. Harder,” she pleads. “I want everything.”

He obliges, rolling his hips up into hers. There’s a pressure at the deepest part of the pendulum’s swing that she can’t think about—not yet. She just makes small whines of protest every time he touches his knot to her center. There’s a secondary function to it externally, in the way it finds that perfect rough spot just inside, making her tighten. 

“Everything, please.” There’s no humiliation as she begs. Rey nudges his nose with hers, kissing him one last time as she leverages herself down, down, down. The slide and tug of his cock sinking into her includes the throbbing sensation of his knot, finally, already matching each squeeze of her body as she tenses around him. 

He whispers endearments— _good girl, little girl_ —against her lips. The words taste like heaven, matching the gentle build of the pressure of him inside of her. Her thighs sink against her calves and the stretching becomes overstimulating, almost raw, as she wills him to push even deeper. She’d imagined that the first time would be painful, but it isn’t, almost disappointing in how natural it is. Still, it feels like being forced to tear in two—between the wolf and the human—to be one or the other when she wants to be the latter so badly. She waits, growing familiar with the new sensation of his blood pulsing inside of her.

“This is my first time, too,” he says, holding her to him in the dark. She can’t tell if it means with a woman as much as with who she is—the omega she can no longer reject. 

“Tell me to feel good,” she whispers into his ear. 

“Feel good . . . enjoy this,” he whispers back. It’s a request rather than a command, and yet everything is easier, lighter. Rey kisses him on every rise of her body over his in the solemn promise that what he’s asked of her will come true. He fucks her so deeply her legs become loose, forcing him to pull her hips against his with his massive hands.

She waits for him to come before even thinking of touching herself. It doesn’t take long, his sweat acrid when she bites his collarbone and grinds down against him. Her teeth are what he needed all along: he cries out, jerking beneath her as he thrusts a final time.

And just like that, she can feel him expanding inside of her. It feels impossible, and of course fuller, with the knot swelling until she’s ready to burst. Her fingertips on her clit relieve some of the pressure as she’s pinned down on him and his thumb moves over hers, their fingers moving in synchrony until she’s tensing again, feeling the flutter of his come as she milks it from his body with each squeeze of hers.

She wants more, so much more. He kisses her neck and holds her hair as she forces herself up and down in the tiniest increments, trapped by the knot, winding tighter and tighter until his teeth graze her throat. She shutters around him with a cry, released. 

They end forehead to forehead, neither of them deigning to speak in the peaceful afterglow of their shared release. She basks in the soft gush inside of her of his own, prolonged orgasm filling her, soothing the ache of the heat. He helps her rearrange her legs so she’s resting in his lap, wrapping her knees around his wide hips.

“How long does it last?” she asks, finally, tracing the lines of his powerful back.

“About a half an hour, sometimes less.”

She laughs and he flinches. “Did I hurt you?”

“No, not at all. It’s just . . . sensitive.”

“I could come again if you want,” she says, relishing the thought of him pleading for freedom from her hungry body. He answers by bringing his hands up to her face, angling her head so he can look at her. Kylo’s brown eyes are warm, full of some emotion she can’t pinpoint. Self-consciousness floods through her, dampening the urge to caress his face in return.

“Tell me about you,” he says, searching her with his gaze.

“No.” Rey shakes her head. “Not now.”

His left eye twitches slightly, his only bodily response. “What would you like?”

“Tell me what you want. From me, when this is over.”

“Not now,” he echoes. He jerks his head with a frown shading his mouth, accepting her terms and releasing her face. She misses that touch immediately, knowing she’d cut a cord that should not have been released. “We can just be quiet.”

“I’d like that, I think.” She rests her head on his chest, fingers digging into the tight muscles at the place between his neck and shoulder. The fire crackles into death below as they simply breathe into one another, finding the shared rhythm they'd had when she’d rested against his _lupus_.


	5. Pain

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Where were you when I was out of line?_   
>  _I know, I don't know_   
>  _You and me in your thoughts, alone_   
>  _So it goes, so it goes_   
>    
>  _I am needing this from you tonight_   
>  _Your side, your dark side_   
>  _I want you to turn off the light_   
>  _Your side, your dark side_   
>  [ Boy Harsher — "Pain"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H1Zm6E6Sy4Y)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is the result of [Caisha](https://archiveofourown.org/users/caisha/pseuds/caisha) aka [reylosource](http://twitter.com/reylosource) on tumblr asking me for more kink, and for [Enterprisingly](https://archiveofourown.org/users/enterprisingly) aka [Cait](http://twitter.com/commandercait) holding my hand through it when I needed it the most. I'm lucky to have you.
> 
> All grammatical and repetition errors are mine, I have been overediting as usual.
> 
>  
> 
> [This AO3 Tag Generator post came for my life while writing this, enjoy.](https://twitter.com/ashesforfoxes/status/1077103961595797504)

“Breakfast is almost ready,” she calls. “Come down, I know you can taste it.” 

Ben stumbles down the stairs in the low light of dawn, interrupting Rey’s mad dash around the kitchen with pans sizzling. There’s even coffee—the wonderfully neutral smell filling the whole house. Outside snow has accumulated in thick drifts, icicles dripping from the porch outside the open window. 

“I’m not really good at this,” Rey admits as she rotates sausages with a fork. “Most of my meals come out of a box or a tin.”

“It smells fine to me,” he says, standing behind her and kissing the top of her head. The pan of eggs is on its way to burning so he helps her, the silence between them punctuated only by a toaster popping. The aroma had pulled him out of a dreamless sleep the moment she’d turned the stove on, but he’d languished in bed to listen to her work, the unexpected domesticity of it all making his heart ache.

“How are you feeling?” he asks, feigning nonchalance.

“Starving,” Rey says. 

“Obviously,” he huffs. “I meant about . . . this.”

“Maybe a little horny.”

Ben makes a noise that should have been a laugh. “Are you sore?”

“I have a kink in my neck from falling asleep on your arm but yes . . . I would like to do that again soon,” she says, moving to slice up a tomato and sprinkle it with salt and pepper before selecting a fresh orange from a bag. 

After years of burying his feelings in a pit and locking it away from everyone, he shouldn’t expect anything different from her. But there’s something maddening in the way she’s avoiding him. His mouth finds the soft line of her neck as she works, trailing his lips through the fine down and her bright scent. Rey doesn’t drop the knife but angles back against his body, humming contentedly.

“The house is going to burn down if you don’t stop distracting me,” she says once he’s worked up to the spot where her ear connects with her jaw.

Ben reaches over to turn the range off, shoving the pans to the back burners. His hand returns to find the bottom of the shirt—his shirt—she’s wearing. He palms the soft curve of her hips to discover she isn’t wearing any underwear, and when he experimentally traces the gap between her legs the slipperiness there coats his fingertips. She whines a little as his touch drifts lower, then up again across her cleft without pressure. 

“I’m going to fuck you,” he says, not prepared for how immediately hard he is, how much he needs to bury himself inside of her. “Right here.”

“Yes,” she groans, sweeping aside the cutting board. She places her elbows on the counter to lean back into him further and whatever self-control he thought he’d still had vanishes into the ether. His clothing-trapped cock sinks between her buttocks and he has to pull back, at risk of losing it just from that. 

“You’re going to come for me when I tell you to.” The words are out of him before he can even modulate them to be less aggressive. She doesn’t seem to mind, whimpering beneath the fingers he’s dragging across her soft skin. 

“I want you to beg for it,” he tries, feeling his face burn at his own boldness.

Rey whines in response, her hand reaching for his thigh to pull him against her. He grabs it and brings her arm back to the linoleum countertop, pinning her wrist down.

“I’ll tell you when you can touch me.” His teeth graze her ear as he positions his hand behind her, pushing two fingers inside of her and relishing the clench of her thighs and the smoothness inside. She’s constricting by small degrees, his forearm digging into the curvature of her ass to keep her from grinding against him. She keeps moving back in an attempt to, so he punishes her with a third finger.

“Don’t move or I’ll stop,” he warns, pushing deep inside as he runs his other hand up her arched back over soft cotton. His fingers bury in her hair, fisting into the loose, chestnut strands and pulling as he delves for the softness and warmth. She cries out as he pins her against the countertop, his mouth latching onto her exposed neck.

“Oh fuck, _fuck_. Fuck me,” she gasps. “Get inside of me.”

“Beg,” he says.

“I need you,” she whines angrily, pushing her head back against his shoulder. “Please.”

“Come for me first,” he says, fucking her with his hand, knuckles curving against the slightly rougher spot just inside. She’s as thick as honey and just as sweet under his tongue. 

“I can’t, it’s not en—” He doesn’t let her finish, biting down hard at the place where her neck meets her shoulder, exposed by the overwide collar. It’s far enough away from where he can mark her for safety but close enough that it’s like going face-first into a spice cabinet. She’s vanilla and jasmine and it takes all his willpower not to pierce her skin, to just leave an indent as she writhes beneath him. 

_Come for me, Rey._ He tells her—this time it’s with the _voice_ , the one he feels just a twinge of guilt at using, but then she’s screaming out, squeezing his hand with her body as she falls apart around him. The little quakes seem to ripple down through her body as she slides bonelessly against the counter, coming to rest on the smooth linoleum. 

“Do you still want me to beg?” she asks when he finally eases his fingers from her, releasing a small gush of fluid down her trembling thighs. 

“Yes,” he says, pulling his cock out from his pants and guiding the swollen, purplish head between her legs. A moan rises up from his own chest as he teases himself with her silkiness. “But I’m not going to make you.”

She twists her body to look back at him, flushed and bright-eyed. There’s that feral look again, beneath the glow of relief and pleasure. 

“Give me what I asked for,” she says. 

“You should turn around, otherwise—”

“Shut up and fuck me as hard as you can,” she says, and immediately he’s compelled. It feels like being pulled by a hundred, taut strings hooked into his very being. He sinks into her, relishing the ease with which the base of his cock can fit in her this second time. He’s bottoming out with each thrust, trying and failing to keep her body from slamming into the cabinets. At least he can save her hips from the counter’s edge by holding on, scraping his knuckles. 

The pain is a means back to some control, a distraction from the orgasm already building inside and threatening to erupt out of him as he pounds into her. He bends his knees to find the right angle, unable to pull out fully as she stands on her tiptoes and shoves her body back down onto him. 

“Tell me not to come. Please.” He growls into her ear.

“I’ll tell you when to come,” she says between gasps. “ _You_ have to beg for it.”

He grits his teeth but there’s a twisted smile already on his mouth, a feeling like she’s unearthed a part of him he’d never really looked at since burying it, years ago. He doesn’t just want her to own him; she already does. He wants her to destroy him.

“Please,” he moves his hands up to pull her body to his beneath her shirt, practically carrying her as he thrusts upwards into her.

“No.” Rey’s holding on to the countertop for leverage, her fingernails creating furrows, the seasoned wood curling into gold. She doesn’t let him release even when she’s come again, screaming hoarsely as he fucks her with a thumb pressed into her clit. He’s in pain now, actually begging, pushing through desperation by mentally sharing with her how his balls are aching and his desire to come undone with her. He feels the change inside of her, his body plying for a secret, shared joy that she won’t gift him.

She laughs instead, the taut line of her control holding against his will. Rey pushes back to grind her perfect body against his groin with gentler movements, her hand palming his face. He leans down, unable to meet her mouth, settling sloppy, rushed kisses on her cheek. 

“Knot me,” she says, finally, and he only has a second before he’s thrusting deep inside her, barely moving as his vision blackens for a moment with the rush of blood from his head. She’s still gyrating against him as his knot swells, each squeeze of her body when she breathes or says his name pulling more out of him. He collapses against her strong frame, burying his face in the spot at the right side of her neck—the one she doesn’t even seem to know about. Still she’s frozen beneath him, aware by inference he could mark her if he wanted to. 

He licks her, the salt of her skin in his mouth long before the overload of _her_ taste, the kind no one could ever replicate. It’s ambrosia on a level that negates the need to ever do another drug, or to ever drink another drink. Bliss takes him down to the kind of place he’d only ever found meditating, when he’d needed to bury the wolf and be human.

“Are you hungry?” she asks after almost a minute of just ragged breathing, her giggle causing him to inhale sharply as she tenses around his now-sensitive cock.

“I don’t know if I can eat like this,” he chokes. “Or stand for much longer. Maybe we should sit down.”

With some negotiation and the most hellishly embarrassing shuffling possible they make it to the couch, where she lays back across his spread-eagled body. After a moment her hand rises to blindly trace his features. 

“That was something,” Rey says, shifting around until she’s comfortable. “Did you like it?”

“Yes.” He’s surprised he’s still capable of speech. “Did you?”

There’s a pause as she mulls it over, and he can see her bottom lip curl beneath her teeth in profile. “I did. You just caught me off guard.”

“I’m sorry. I got carried away.”

“Rutting does that,” she says distantly. “I guess I did, too.”

“No, you were . . . amazing.” He noses through her mussed brown hair to kiss the top of her scalp. There’s something absolutely normal about this strange girl being wrapped in his arms, over his cock, her closed lashes fluttering with each sigh. “You are perfect.”

“No one’s ever called me that before,” she says, her voice drifting into sleepiness even though the room is growing lighter shades of gray as daylight suffuses the snow-filled landscape outside the window.

He saves his breath and tells her in thoughts, even when she’s dozing, how he feels. 

* * *

The passage of time becomes mostly indistinguishable as they settle into a cycle dictated by her body—a cycle that has only grown more intense in the past day. If it weren’t for the necessary refractory period she’s sure she’d be on her back permanently, thoughts overwhelmed by the need for him to be inside of her, to push to the point of filling that empty space inside of her only he can seem to satiate. 

But he’s shy and reserved past the occasional flickers of Alpha that bubble up when he’s fully immersed in her body, and she has glimpses of a socially awkward boy, one that probably spent more time indoors than hunting and killing for all appearances to the contrary. It gives her a perverse pleasure to interrupt their conversation about movies over a very cold breakfast by asking if she can taste him. Watching his ears turn a shade of crimson makes something jump in her stomach, as if she were witnessing a secret. 

He’s still flushed, in a different way, as she gets on her knees in front of his chair and pulls out his cock to try and jam as much of it in her mouth as possible. There’s nothing subtle about her attempt until he sends her discreet impressions of porn—the kind of stuff she’d always found ridiculous—but with some prompting and his hand working the base she finds the best way to suck at him, her cheeks pulling against his length. 

He’s groaning like a dying man when she finds the right twist and draw of her tongue across the sensitive place beneath his head, her hands over his own as hot fluid fills her mouth and dribbles down her chin. She doesn’t hate the taste for how good it makes her feel to control him, to overwhelm him, and the way his dark eyes settle on her with disbelief and a need that won’t die no matter how long they touch or kiss.

They try everything in the book that she’s aware of, but her experimentation has a limit. It’s only the third day of their unrepentant fuckfest when she asks him again for what she really wants. The thing he seems most hesitant about. 

They’re sitting on the couch under a musty-smelling blanket, trying to get through one of what seems like a dozen Lord of the Rings VHS tapes, pulled from a well-worn boxed set. Kylo actually seems engrossed in watching the films, spouting terms like “Sindarin” and “Melkor” even though she can barely tell the hobbits apart from each other with the drunken stupor of the heat fully set in.

“Will you change for me?” she whispers into his ear over the muffled sound of swords clashing. Strong hands dig into her side, fingers falling into the dips in her ribcage as he turns back to watch the small, low-res TV screen. 

“You don’t actually want that,” he says, eyes distant. “You just think you do.”

“Don’t—”

“Don’t patronize you, I know.” He pecks the top of her forehead absentmindedly. “Tell me why you want it.”

She has to think, mapping out his freckles on his bicep to his broad chest, where she knows they’re hidden beneath his soft flannel shirt. “I want the wolf.”

“You don’t want the _actual_ wolf, you want the monster. At least, I hope you don’t.” 

She grunts impatiently. “I want _you_.”

“Would you fuck an orc?” He gestures at the screen. 

“If you were one, yes,” she doesn’t hesitate to answer, even if her lip curls at the image of the snaggle-toothed creatures. 

“My _glabro_ looks worse,” he laughs. “Let’s wait until after your heat, if you want it so badly.”

Rey groans, tugging at his shirt. “Let me decide that. I want to see.”

He fills her mind with fleeting thoughts of some old black-and-white film version of a wolfman as she arches against him, and she realizes he’s distracting her. 

“ _I want you to show me_ ,” she says into his neck. He pauses the movie to look down at her, eyes wide with an almost wounded expression at the tone she’d conjured up. 

“That wasn’t really an order,” Rey find herself sheepish now that she has his attention. “It was a request.”

“I know. But I don’t have to follow if I don’t want to,” he clarifies.

“What are you afraid of?” she asks, running her hand through his hair. The black curls have only become more defined with sweat and her constant attention to it.

“I’m not afraid,” he murmurs. His eyes are very dark, pupils contracted. “But you should be.”

“I trust you. You can just show me, if you want.” Rey palms the unmarked side of his face, willing him to listen to her. She can feel the tics in his face as he works through some emotion otherwise hidden to her. 

“Show only,” he offers after a beat, a smile twisting his mouth. “But I have terms. Take off your clothes.”

She tries to quell her enthusiasm, losing the little clothing she’s wearing with no effort at seduction. Joy turns to confusion as he begins ripping the fabric of her shirt apart with quick twists of his hands, littering the arm of the couch with scraps. 

“You have to be tied up,” he explains, braiding sections of his destroyed shirt into something resembling bindings. She finds herself vibrating with excitement, watching him work.

“Worried I’ll jump your bones that quickly?” she teases.

“It’s more to stop you from running screaming,” he shrugs. “Hands behind your back.”

Rey obliges, blood thrumming in her ears as he wraps her wrists together, checking to make sure its a comfortable but tight fit. When he requests her legs she sweeps them over his lap eagerly, feet pressed together so he can encircle her ankles with black cotton.

“Good girl,” he lifts her bound legs to press a kiss to the top of her foot. “Are you ready?”

“Yes,” she breathes, scooting back on the couch to give him space. “Please.”

“Alright,” he says, picking up the remote. 

The room is filled once more with the sounds of battle and the swell of overly dramatic music as the film resumes. Kylo shifts into the far edge of the couch, stealing the blanket out from under her and staring at the screen.

“What are you doing?” Rey growls.

“Finishing the movie.” His dry tone is edged with self-satisfaction.

“But—”

“Terms,” he interrupts her. “Don’t make me gag you, too.”

Rey snarls aloud, kicking into the couch cushions. “I’m not watching this bullshit.”

“Says the woman who made me watch Point Break,” he gestures at her pile of movies: the only ones she actually knows thanks to Plutt’s pack’s preferred form of entertainment being Predator rewatches. She’s not surprised at his reaction to the collection of what he’d called “Dad movies” in a bemused tone, but rather that he prefers elves over the Terminator.

“You’re a fucking nerd, Ben Solo,” she teases, squirming. 

His eyes flick towards her for only a moment. “As much as it is my preferred death at this point, I need a break from you trying to kill me from exhaustion.”

“I thought Alphas could please their mates,” she spits. The words don’t even appear to register beyond the ghost of a smile on his lips, and she groans to herself, slumping forward into his blanketed lap. He’s forced to let her flop into a more comfortable position, ignoring her grousing. When her head finally settles against his knee he lays a hand on her head, gently stroking her hair. The touch soothes her into immobility.

“Why is that man so obsessed with getting that ring?” Rey asks. The warmth inside grows golden with each caress of his fingers, but she can’t relax.

“Shh. Just watch.” His chastisement is accompanied by his hand traveling lower down her back, tracing the knobs in her spine. Her hands and feet twist in their bonds involuntarily as the gentle administrations remind her what she can earn if she just behaves through the end of the tape. 

It’s strange, as uninvested in the story as she is, she’s enthralled by the combination of landscape-heavy visuals against the slow and steady movement of his hand on her body. It quickly becomes clear that if she remains quiet, translating her contentment through muted noises and slow changes in her body position, he’ll reward her with more. She shifts by degrees into his lap, his fingers going lower by benefit of her head finding his other knee.

“It’s almost over,” he assures her, fingers idly following the muscles in her back to the dimple just above her buttocks. His touch circles lower, their silent foreplay interrupted by some dramatic moment playing out that she’s only peripherally aware of beneath the haze of arousal. 

“Please don’t stop,” she says, rubbing her face against the scratchy, wool blanket, rooting around for whatever part of him is underneath. She’s halted by a short, quick smack on her behind. 

It’s not painful at all, just surprising. Heat flares in her face as she does the math on whether or not she liked it. Turning her head she can see he’s watching her, looking back to the screen just as quickly as her head has turned.

“Be still. This is an important part,” he says, his own face red with what she assumes is embarrassment. _Idiot_ , she thinks, hoping he can hear her. 

Rey can’t understand how an extended montage of someone getting shot with arrows is important, but she heaves a sigh and settles again. When he continues to ignore her she resumes marking his lap, twisting to try and bring his touch to where she needs it. He’s wooden beneath her, hand rising up from her body again in a denial of touch.

“Do it again,” she says into the blanket, unexpectedly shy.

The crack from the next slap is louder, and this time she can feel it, gasping. It’s so close to where she needs it, the throbbing between her legs all the stronger for the sharpness of pain.

“Again.” 

“I see,” he says, voice thick. “You want to be punished.”

“Please. Anything.”

He rubs the sore skin of her right cheek before laying down another, harder blow. The ache has her curling around his legs, thighs clenching as she pulls upwards and closer to his raised hand.

“Please.” 

“You asked.” 

The next sharp crack on her skin is accompanied by a burning sensation once the initial pain disappears. And yet its something she needs more than wants—his attention crucial in the way he holds back the strength she knows he has. 

“I’ll watch if you just touch me,” she offers, rubbing the tears that had sprung out unbidden into the itchy wool over his right thigh. She’d felt his hardness beneath her a half-hour ago, but his need for a break had kept her more tame. It was to be expected that he needed some time after a whole day. That doesn’t stop her from lifting her behind more, inviting him to continue. 

“Good girl,” he soothes, hand tracing across the stinging skin. “Just this last scene.”

He’s not lying about important, in terms of how long the movie spends on this guy’s death and shots of the little people going into a boat, everyone staring longingly at each other, but Rey finds peace in his administrations. His fingers rub away the soreness as the bruises melt away, finally moving down between her buttocks to her core and conjuring up a muffled cry when he traces unseen shapes in her slick. By the credits, when he shuts the television off, she’s soaked and laid over his lap, gasping.

“Can I?” His fingers are dipping maddeningly, all as he looks down her 

“Only if you change,” she says, voice thick. “Terms.” Her heartbeat is stuttering in her chest with each palpation of his fingers. His approval is apparent as he sits up, grabbing her gently to reposition her so she’s slung over the arm of the couch, moving behind her.

“May I?” The words are low and husky in her ear as he slips a piece of fabric over her face,not yet tying it. 

“But I want to see you,” she protests.

“It’s weird enough doing this without you seeing some in-between shape where my face is fucked up,” he explains. “Indulge me.”

She grits her teeth, but the caress of his fingers on her ears draws her down and back into allowing a need over a want, and she nods. 

“Tell me if you want me to stop, anytime, Rey.” His hands are gentle as he ties the blindfold around her head, pulling strands of hair from her face, gently, and tucking them in. “This is yours.”

“Just change for me. And touch me.” she pleads, settling into the darkness. It’s a more familiar world here, with the hyperawareness of where his body is, his gin-and-tonic scent enveloping her. She hears him remove his shirt and pants, the couch squeaking sadly as he takes his place behind her, adjusting her arms to rest comfortably on her lower back. 

“Only for you.” His hands hold her hips where she kneels right before there’s a chill in the air, a sudden pressure on the back of her thighs as his grip digs in for a moment, nails suddenly longer.

Her words catch in her throat the first time she feels the hot fire of Kylo’s breath on her back, the soft brush of a tongue against her pinioned wrists and curled fingers. She jerks within his grasp, stopped by the pinpricks of claws. It’s impossible to discern what he looks like from the little grazes of muzzle, but she can feel the roughness of hands callused into pads, and there’s the tickle of fur as his transformed thumbs sink into her buttocks, spreading them apart.

“Oh fuck,” she arches down to the couch to give him better access, opening her legs as best as she can with the bonds.

The wait for him to resume is endless, her whines cut short the moment his quick exhalations cool the moisture between her legs. He nudges her with a much longer nose than she remembers, the tongue that follows textured but soft. Bliss explodes inside of her as he licks her from pulsing center to the curve of her back, dragging slick up with each slow draw. 

There’s the faintest reminder of his teeth when he buries his face between her legs, tonguing her entrance until she’s writhing. The dull ache of desire becomes electric, grounded somewhere outside of her unseen. Rey’s body is left to sensation, leaning back into him to get the press of incisors against her thighs. A wide hand wraps under her belly, the length of the forearm resting against her side hot against her.

“Untie me,” she says aloud, knowing he can’t respond in any form of communication mid-shift. “Let me feel you.”

Her hands are freed with a ripping sound. Rey only has a moment to bring her arms forward to leverage against the couch when he’s hoisting her up by the hips again, hand sliding into the gap between her thighs. That’s when she can feel how close to human he must still be, his rough-calloused thumb pressing to her ass while his over-long index finger circles her. He’s so gentle she barely feels the hardness of his now-pointed nails—not even when he spreads her with a second finger.

“Oh fuck,” she tries to hold still but she can feel the new softness of his pelt where skin had been, damp with her. She begs for his mouth, to taste him with a kiss, and is answered only by the low rumble of his breathing. The strength of his hand has her rocking into the couch arm but it’s the gentle pressure against and inside of her that’s making her match him for strength as she tries to get him to penetrate her deeper. 

“I want you inside of me.” 

There’s just silence in answer, his hand leaving. She reaches back for him, feeling his grip encircle her wrist and pull her away. He doesn’t have to go far to set her palm down in front of her head, casting a shadow in the darkness as she feels him dwarf her frame. A little moan escapes her as his face passes through her hair, a mouth with dry lips broken by overlong teeth grazing her shoulder. 

The stimulation is sending color streaking behind her eyelids. His smell is more animal now, and yet still clean—like curling into a pine bough he’d slept in. She manages to reach back and grab his left thigh, finding his leg bent crooked, accounting for the sound of nails scraping on the floorboards. She knows his legs well, but this is very, very different—the thick, wiry hair not quite as soft as she’d pictured. He’s still too big for the couch, she thinks, and the very thought makes her arch deeper, pushing against him. 

The noises he makes are strange—half-human growls and almost plaintive whining—and the monster inside of her uncoils at the sound. In a gesture that speaks to the limited control he shuffles back back, the couch creaking.

“You can’t hurt me,” she reminds him between breaths. “You really can’t.”

He answers with a hard nip on the top of her shoulder, not quite breaking skin. She bucks under him, just as his tongue laps at the minor wound. 

“Okay, okay,” she says as a mantra to calm herself, bringing her hand down to stroke her clit. “Let me.”

His approval is a hand encircling her neck, absolutely gentle despite the sheer breadth of his transformed fingers. Claws snag in her hair and blindfold as she moves for them both, chasing the soothing tempo that brings their bodies together by small degrees. He grants her a prize to be fought for by grasping her just close enough to feel his torso. It’s then that she can hear his verbal response, so high-pitched surely only the late-blooming winter moths outside can hear it.

Every bend of her knees against his frame brings his fingers deeper but he’s too tall, heaving over her, for her to press against his groin. The brush of fur against her back is weirdly precious, something to be cherished as much as the elongated thumb stroking her neck muscles as he _whuffs_ into her hair. Kylo sounds more and more strangled as she moves against him, the sound almost like sobbing for the bleed-through of human vocal chords. 

“Help me, please,” Rey says. She’s still stroking herself but the joy is leaving her like rain soaked into the earth, that ache uneased. There’s no pleasure in him frozen behind her, and her desire is an annoyance now that she can scent the bitter tang of his anxiety on the air.

Rey knows that feeling, and stops immediately, pulling away and pivoting to find him again. She can’t see him but she reaches out and finds him in the void, his head far above until it dips down to rest on top of hers. She holds him tight, ignoring which body parts rest against which, just enfolding into his presence: so warm and yet so distant.

“Change back, please.” She murmurs into the breastbone beneath her face, its shape dipping inward. 

The air erupts into warmth in the same way candle wax spattering across a table conjures up a burn. Rey rips off her mask, one-handed, afraid to lose contact. Then there’s just him, naked and coated with sweat as his hands ghost over her back. She pulls him to her again, needing him closer than touch can grant. 

“I’m sorry, Rey. I’m so sorry, I can’t.” Kylo’s whispered words are against her skull and it feels so right to hear his voice again that she shudders in his embrace.

“It’s okay,” she murmurs. “You did so good.”

“I thought I could, I just . . .”

“I pushed you too hard.” 

“That’s one way of putting it.” His muted laughter is a salve. “You have no idea how much I wanted to. I just . . . I just couldn’t.”

“What’s wrong?” Rey asks, the warmth easing up her body in response to his settling. 

The breath he releases on her shoulder dries the beads of sweat on her skin, leaving her cold.

“I’m afraid,” he says, after what seems like an eternity. At least he understands what she means already, but then it’s been hard to hide what she’s thinking.

“Afraid of what?” Rey asks, threading her fingers through the hair falling across his pale forehead. It’s impossible to ignore the moisture welling in his red-tinged eyes. “Hurting me?”

“You can change, too,” Kylo says as he shakes his head. “You know you have less control when you’ve turned.”

She’s genuinely confused. “It’s a spectrum. There’s me, and then there’s me. I don’t know where the line is drawn.”

“But you’re an animal when you change,” he says. “You’d eat someone if they threatened you.”

“True.” She presses a smile to his lips, having to reach upward since he’s pulled back. He doesn’t struggle as her tongue draws over the seams of his lips, tasting herself as she’s been wont to do lately. “I’ve never been threatened by you. At least not here.”

Kylo is silent in answer. 

“I’d give it to you, if I could,” she says. “The wolf, that is.”

“Do you think I’d want it?” His voice cracks.

“I don’t think you’ve been given the space to try.” She consumes his lips, so lush her whole mouth sinks into them. They grow redder with each touch, bruised and perfect. She hasn’t bitten them again since their first kiss, but she’s thought about it every time since. For once, it doesn’t feel welcome or right. 

“I’ve heard stories. Horrible ones.” He blinks to sweep the memories away. She’s thankful he doesn’t share any of that imagery. “You know what the lack of control is like.”

“I don’t,” Rey says. “I’ve always been me.”

“But you know what . . . we can be like when we have nothing to hold us back,” he says. “I never want to put you in harm’s way.”

“I trust you,” she says. His smooth biceps practically crush her in how hard he holds her once he can see how serious she is. 

“You shouldn’t.” His words echo in a room empty besides their breathing and the low fire collapsing. 

“I won’t ask for anything more that you can give me, I promise.” Rey knows that she shouldn’t ask but the need inside of her is a flare kindled and still burning without any hope of completion. “But I want to know what you really are.” 

“Sweet girl,” he murmurs. “Let me make love to you.”

She pulls back at the word but his face, wracked with both guilt and acceptance, keeps her in his arms. He leans down and this time their kiss feels like completion—a line drawn in the sand that neither will ever walk across. 

* * *

He hadn’t been quick to laugh or smile before, but the lack is more apparent afterwards, when he leaves her to take a shower. She lets him be, washing off in the sink and going outside with a mug of hot tea to watch the lake sparkle in the warm light from the dock. It’s the only beacon in a darkness contrasted by a fresh layer of snow: a pristine invitation to run and roll in it. The heady _rooibos_ eases through the almost-sanitized smell of winter forest. 

They’re halfway through this madness. The wolf is already whimpering; she’s afraid to leave—knowing the emptiness will eventually return. Rey understands well how her body will snap back into its solitary state, where she’d punch a stranger just for jostling into her. She’s used to being untouched, but it feels like a distant dream. She wants to be near him all the time, to wrap herself tightly into his being until they’re merged.

 _You have a mate_ , her traitorous heart tells her. There’s no denying it, but under her fever the predator she knows how to be calculates the reality. He’s still an enemy, a killer. What kind of protection could he truly offer? What kind of life?

The liquid in her mug is cold by the time he joins her, crouching to wrap an afghan around her shoulders. 

“Trying to freeze?” His tone is amused but he’s clearly chiding her.

“It feels good.” She hadn’t even considered the fact that she was naked, finding her thighs pressed into the frost-covered wood of the stoop. She clutches the crocheted edges with one hand, bowing her head and hiding her face with her hair.

“You can still catch a chill,” he says, placing something down beside her hip. The gunpowder smell and the large shape has her scooting aside, looking up at his face, feeling concern knit her brow. 

“What do you need that for?” she asks, keeping her voice steady as he sets her hand on the matte black shape of the handgun. 

“It’s for you,” he says. “Do you know how to fire a handgun?”

She nods, swallowing.

“You’re pretty good with a shotgun,” he offers wryly. “But this is a .45 caliber. You remember the kick?”

“Sure,” Rey cringes, thinking of Plutt’s other scavengers laughing at her as she tried her best to hit bottles in the junkyard. They’d never really taught her beyond the basics: never aim at anyone, always check the chamber. She picks it up, marveling at how huge the grip is in her small hands. It’s heavy, and technical looking, feeling dangerous to hold as she peers down the barrel. “Just aim and shoot?”

“Something like that,” he says, reaching over to show her the safety—flicking it off. “Just be careful—finger off the trigger, point the gun away from you.”

“Silver bullets?” Rey asks when the familiar burn hits her nose. She blinks up at his impassive face, still holding the gun in front of her. 

“For your protection,” he says, scooting behind her and wrapping his torso around her back to guide her arms in front of her. His close proximity always makes her stomach flutter, as tainted by Irish Spring and gun oil as it is now. His fingers are massive, tracing along the sensitive backs of her hands and positioning her right hand on the grip, index finger out before wrapping her left around it. 

“Aim at the light pole,” he tells her. “Line up the front and rear sights, and focus on the front.”

Rey breathes, finally, vision swimming as she raises the gun and tries to stop from shaking. 

“You want me to shoot?” she asks.

“Sure,” he answers behind her, releasing her so she can aim on her own. “It’s going to have some kick, just try to keep your grip and don’t flinch.” 

Rey closes her left eye, keeping the distant gray line in front of her, startled when his hands come up to cup her ears. “You won’t have ear protection in an emergency. It always hurts,” he says, muffled. 

“Thanks for the warning,” she raises the gun, again, concentrating. Somehow it’s easier with his fingertips on her temples, holding her steady. The blanket slinks from her shoulders as she breathes slowly, exhaling right before she squeezes the trigger, her heart skipping a beat in anticipation.

The resulting sound is deafening even with his hands around her ears. The biting smoke burns her throat. She has no idea if she’d hit the pole in the dimness, but his resultant chuckle is answer enough. 

“Good work,” he says, reaching out to grab the gun by the barrel and pull it from her loose hands. He inspects it and flips the safety before setting it down. “You’re a natural. We can practice tomorrow with less expensive ammo.”

“No one’s ever showed me, really,” Rey admits.

“My dad taught me how,” he says softly, passively tracing the cross-hatched grip.

“I didn’t know him very long.” The words rush out of her unbidden. “He was gruff, but he was kind to me. Like your mom.”

His jaw shifts, eyes locked at the ground away from her.

“I never knew my parents. I think they abandoned me,” she says. “Or maybe they were murdered. I don’t know. I killed my first alpha.”

Her confession brings him back to her, eyes obsidian in the ambient light from the windows. 

“What did he do to you?” he asks.

“Nothing.” Rey cowers into her blanket, overwhelmed by the feeling of being very small.

 _“_ What did he do to you _?”_ Kylo’s voice is a knife pulled against a whetstone, drawing her out.

“He didn’t get to do what he wanted to do.” Rey swallows. “I can protect myself.”

He studies her, emotions warring in his expression, as his hands come up to her face. “I know you can. That’s why I need—”

— _you to be my mate._

She cuts him off before he can speak, leaning forward and up to kiss him deeply. She can’t hear him say aloud what he’s emanating in look and scent and the terrifyingly strong waves of emotion roiling off of him. He holds still as she pours herself into the space between his legs and arms, tugging at his hair to press herself to him again. 

“I’d like to see you.” Rey admits. “Not right now, but soon.”

“I’m ready, I think,” he says into her mouth, eyes closed. Somehow she knows he’s not talking about sex, or even pleasure. There’s a grimness in his expression that betrays the thoughts that must have been running through his head since they’d been interrupted.

“We don’t have to rush,” she says, not really convinced but relieved all the same. 

“I’ll need to go slow. And you’ll need the gun.”

She helps him up, cold air gnawing at her body until they’re back in the warmth of the cabin. 

He seems at a loss, standing in the living room staring at the stuffed corpse of a rainbow trout on the mantle while she lifts his shirt to reveal the deep lines of his abdomen. It feels wrong to her—so suddenly and horribly—that she pulls back and starts looking for her own clothing.

“Rey, what are you doing?”

“I don’t want this to be sexual,” she says, donning a mostly clean shirt and leggings. “It doesn’t feel right.”

“I want you at least to see me this time,” he says while she twists her hair into a bun. When she turns to look at him, his angular face is wrought with anxiety.

“I’d like that,” she says. “Will you let me touch you?”

Kylo’s frame heaves with a sigh. 

“I don’t know how much control I’ll be able to maintain if I go to _crinos_. Keep the gun in reach.” He gestures at the gun on the ottoman.

“I trust you,” she says, standing on her tiptoes to press a kiss to his lips.

He hardly helps her undress him, and she makes the act as gentle and as comforting as possible, tracing her lips over his skin when its revealed, rubbing the hard line of his thigh bone when she pulls the drawstring of his pants and pushes them down. She even extricates his feet, kneeling before him and looking up plaintively. 

“You’re not comfortable,” she declares when she sees his tortured expression. “We don’t have to do this.”

“No,” he says, pulling her up to press their bodies together again. His pale musculature is molten beneath the fabric of her clothing. “Just preparing mentally.”

“Can I hold you?” she asks.

“Yes.”

She rests her ear against his sternum, watching the fire as he breathes softly beneath her—his heart a jackhammer. In a few moments there’s the sudden drop in temperature, the feeling like the room, including her, is being sucked into a gravity well with him at the core. The change is always like that; she’d heard it explained that energy and matter had to come from somewhere—even if it was just the air around them. Beneath her cheek his skin bristles with hair, becoming even softer as she closes her eyes and feels the transformation with her hands splayed on his sides, his body expanding and growing beneath her. 

She takes a step back when it’s clear he’s taking up more space than before, the legs in front of her curving into a more stooped shape. He’s crouched over her, her neck bending far when she looks up. The ceilings of the open room are tall but he fills the space: he’s upwards of nine feet, an enormous black shape breathing with the rattle of a sleeping giant.

“Kylo,” she breathes, reaching out to his enormous, furred chest.

He growls, the sound vibrating her entire body, but she doesn’t pull away. His clawed feet scratch against the floor as he moves back, even sharper claw-tipped hands coming up between them. The room is small now, and Rey finds herself backing into the small couch beneath the window. He’s still dangerously close, with the posture and rumble of a threatened animal.

“Alright,” Rey says, lowering her hands and dipping her head slightly. “You first. Your terms.”

The werewolf shakes himself, flame-orange eyes blinking slowly as he sniffs at her. His muzzle is almost the size of her entire head, the dusting of white on his chin and the streak across his face a lightning strike in it’s increased size. The teeth exposed past black gums are easily the circumference of one of her fingers. Despite her own gift, he could end her life with a single swipe or bite. The thought sends an electric current of fear and arousal down her spine, making the world spin.

“I’ve never seen anything like you before,” she says, standing still. “You’re beautiful.”

As beastly as he is, his eyes seem to recognize her words, ears flicking forwards finally as he lowers his face to hers. She lets the black, twitching nose scent her, avoiding staring into his eyes. Even if she trusts him, she knows the animal is in charge, and to provoke him would be immensely stupid. 

“Thank you for showing me.” Rey continues to talk, keeping her voice calm and soothing. “I’ve never met another freechanger.”

His thoughts are invisible in _crinos_ , much the same way half-breeds like Chewie can only respond in guttural intonations. Instead he noses her forehead, _whuffing_ across her cheeks and forcing her to stifle a laugh so as not to startle him.

They stay like that for some time, her completely still while he attempts to softly explore her much in the same way a dog would go face first into brambles after a rabbit. Rey fights the urge to reach up, to wrap her hands around the thick neck right in front of her, or pull her fingers through dense fur. Rather she lets him scent along her shoulder and down her arm, claws reaching for her and then curling back into black palms the size of dinner plates. Finally, carefully, he hooks a single curved black nail against her collarbone, grazing but not breaking the flesh. It sends her into a shudder of pleasure, her mouth parting of its own volition. 

He seems to respond in kind, kneeling down to all fours and pressing his head to her chest. She dares to run her hands over the fur-lined bone of his skull, finding he likes his ears scratched just as much in _crinos_. His dry, warm nose nudges at her breastbone, and she gasps. 

“You’re here with me, aren’t you?” Rey asks, finding herself caught in his stare as he looks up at her with an animal’s eyes. It’s dangerous to hold him but there’s nothing in his constricted pupils that makes her afraid, not when his wordless response is to bump her chin with his muzzle.

She presses her face to him, then, smelling both the man and the wolf—losing all sense of constraint to touch him and sliding her hands across his massive shoulders right before he snarls. It’s an angry, horrible noise, and she jerks away—half-expecting the white, sharp teeth to close around her throat. 

But he’s not looking at her; his ears are flattened and he’s staring at the door. 

“Are you alright?” she asks as he follows something in the air and lopes toward the back door, curving in half to peer outside.

Where the wolf might have let out a whine he growls, his clawed hands screeching across the glass. An electric jolt travels up Rey’s spine with the sudden instinct that there’s something out there. Something, someone, is watching them. 

“Who is it?” she asks. His claws plunge between the jamb to tear the door completely off its hinges, tossed to the side like a piece of cardboard as he squeezes through the undersized space. The cold air gusts in, whipping the fire into an inferno, and she’s left with the sudden vacuum of his presence. 

A howl pierces the air just as the night is fractured by gunfire, a flash and _rat-a-tat_ burst coming from the woods to the north of the cabin. Rey bolts back into the living room to grab her gun just as the windows explode, broken glass cascading down over her head. She’s shaking as the laminate wall over the couch ruptures with bullet holes, nostrils burnt by the sulfur. 

Crouched, she focuses on the heavy footfalls on the porch as they grow closer. The first intruder around the door is just black against the blue, the remnants of the fire illuminating his shape. He sees her the moment she takes aim and fires—but the gun in her hand is silent. 

_Safety_ , she thinks, the first dart piercing her skin right below her clavicle. Her thumb works the switch and then she’s unloading the clip, shooting wildly. A ragged hole appears in the masked helmet as yet another dart smacks into her neck, from behind. The entire room lurches, turning upside down. Kylo’s handgun clatters to the floor, much too heavy to lift.

Rey’s hearing is muffled by the ground beneath her slack face. She can hear screams beneath the gunshots, as the boots close in and her vision fades into white noise.

Beneath it all: the sound of an animal in pain, tortured. She follows it into nothingness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun fact: [Lord of the Rings: Return of the King is actually a VHS release you might find in a cabin in the middle of nowhere](https://www.amazon.com/Lord-Rings-Fellowship-Ring-VHS/dp/B000065U6Q). Rey, like all of us, wants to watch _Point Break_ for obvious reasons. I feel I have to pay royalties everytime Kylo goes down on her thanks to a gif from [@slipgoingunder](https://archiveofourown.org/users/slipgoingunder/pseuds/slipgoingunder) that I can no longer link to since tumblr banned female sexuality but featured in one of my favorite fics of all time, [Doing the Unstuck](https://archiveofourown.org/series/1155728). Read it or suffer my undying wrath.
> 
> Anyone who can find me that gif of Keanu going down on and link me on[Twitter](https://twitter.com/ashesforfoxes) is my new best friend, no questions asked.

**Author's Note:**

> Werewolf forms are based on old White Wolf World of Darkness tabletop RPG rules (go ahead, google it. It's safer than searching "knotting"). I also owe Patricia Brigg's Alpha and Omega series although it's been years since I've read it, so it's not a direct influence or rec.
> 
> Find me on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/ashesforfoxes?lang=en) or [tumblr](http://ashesforfoxes.tumblr.com/) and tell me what you think.


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